Introduction

At the end of the 19th century, a popular topic for debate was the apparent relative absence of ‘madness’ among African, Asian, and Native American people. As cited by British psychiatrist Suman Fernando in his book Mental Health, Race and Culture, the comment above was made by the clinical director of Georgia State Sanitarium about the apparent rarity of depression among Black people in the American South. It was typical of the general views among psychiatrists at the time. But, over the last several decades, studies have been emerging in Canada, the USA, and the UK that challenge misconceptions about Black people’s imperviousness to physical and emotional pain. For example, Harriet A. Washington examines pathologising myths about the Black body during the colonial era in her groundbreaking book Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present (2007). She observes that scientists made erroneous claims during the colonial era that the primitive nervous systems of Black people made them immune to physical and emotional pain and to mental illness. According to Washington, physicians advanced theories about the greater immunity of Black people to malaria and yellow fever during the colonial era, although there was no evidence to suggest that they had an innate, absolute resistance to these diseases. These and other stereotypes revealed contradictions about the Black body in two main ways during the colonial era: (a) theories about real and perceived physical differences between Black and White people were beginning to take hold, and (b) myths about the Black body as inherently stronger, more resilient, or resistant to most illnesses were generated (Washington, 2007).