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Summary: AS A HMONG AMERICAN
Review: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall is a novel based on the clash of two cultures---the Hmong culture and the American culture. A little Hmong girl is diagnosed with epilepsy which her parents believe is caused by spirits. Because of this belief, they try to cure her illness not with western medication but their own Hmong ways. There is a huge misunderstanding between the parents and the doctors that Anne Fadiman explores. Anne Fadiman provides readers with a vivid, detailed history of the Hmong in Laos to their involvement in the Vietnam War to their struggles in America that explains this clash. On the other hand, she also explains why Americans see and felt the way they did about the Hmong culture particularly the doctors. One shortcoming is that the author implies that Hmong Americans and their experiences are completely homogenous, but the beauty of this book is that she is able to view both sides without judgment. As a Hmong American, it's hard to imagine an American who can achieve this, but the author achieves this so beautifully. It's hard to look at something from a totally different perspective especially because westerners are very rigid about their beliefs and have a sense of superiority in regards to other cultures thus I was shocked that Fadiman was able to communicate and understand the Hmong in such a way. She did a great job of digging beyond the surface and really understanding the Hmong people, their beliefs, and where they are coming from. As a Hmong American, I think she did a great job! She talked of things that I couldn't imagine an American even knowing about until I read this book. It's great to know that an American can look at the Hmong culture without judgment and even come to admire it and see some good in it even though it's very different from her own beliefs. I recommend this book to anyone especially those that are interested in learning more about the Hmong.
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Summary: Excellent core story but often rambles
Review: I liked the story about the conflict between the Hmong family and Western medicine very much. The author gives fair treatment to all parties. However, I found myself impatient with the crisscrossing of the narrative. I think the book would have been superior had it been cut down in length. The background info on the Hmong, the Vietnam war and Air America, etc. is important but it took way too long to get the significant kernals of info. I can see why this text would be a challenge to edit but don't think the editors were up to the task.
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Summary: A wish for the future
Review: I can only hope that Ann Fadiman is the FIRST and ONLY person permitted to communicate with any alien who chooses to land on this planet and all others must read her findings before any further contact is attempted. We cause such unmeasurable damage out of ignorance, as Lea and her family endured, when we see the world in one demention only. If this can happend when bright and well- intentioned people interact with other bright and well-intentioned people-if of another culture- I fear what mayhem we may cause when we come in contact with members of another species. Makes me hope that SETI is an excersise in futility.
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Summary: This one stays with you
Review: This is the best book I've read in a couple of years. I'm not normally a big reader of nonfiction, but the beauty and honesty of this book captured me. The author is personally entrenched in a dense and complex cultural struggle, yet she remains objective. She manages not only to make sense of it, she paints each character in a very human light -- sometimes you sympathize with them, at other times, you want to strangle them. I liked the alternating chapter pace in which one chapter will follow the main plotline, and then the next will address cultural and historical issues relevant to the main character.By the time I finished this book, I cared so much for Lia, her parents and siblings, as well as her doctors. It breaks your heart how so many people with such good intentions can still not prevent such a tragedy.
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Summary: Amazing
Review: I read this when I was in the wilderness for a week and almost forgot that I was supposed to be enjoying nature and not the amazing book I brought with me. This was the best book I read in 1999.
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Summary: Bridging A Gap
Review: It is often an arduous task to bridge the gap between two conflicting cultures. I think it is very important that all health providers understand that it is crucial to incorporate a patients culture and beliefs into the care they are prescribed. As someone outside of the culture, Anne Fadiman does a good job of embracing the culture and trying to understand their feelings on healing. It is disturbing to detect the sense of superiority that one culture feels they have over another. At the very least this book should open the minds of its readers, especially health care providers, to the importance of cultures and perspectives outside of their own.
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Summary: A spirit caught me up in this book
Review: Anne Fadiman's book is a fascinating account of what happens when a left-brain culture (the American medical establishment) and a right-brain culture (a Hmong refugee family) go on collision course over a very ill little girl. Lia Lee is epileptic; she has uncontrollable seizures which require medical intervention and treatment. Lia's doctors see her family as negligent and ignorant because their inability to follow a complicated medical regimen makes her condition deteriorate; her family see the doctors as arrogant and insensitive, and insist the medicine they are giving her actually made her sicker. The tragedy is that both the doctors and the family genuinely want to help Lia, but their total lack of communication and inability to understand each other, linguistically and culturally, makes cooperation impossible. Those of us in the 'helping' professions (medicine, nursing, social work) often lose sight of the fact that the relationship between 'helper' and 'helpee' is most effective when each sees the other as an equal partner who deserves equal consideration and respect; instead, the 'helpers' often dole out advice and directions which the 'helpees' are expected to follow without question, and are then labeled backwards, resistant, or even negligent, when they refuse. The book zeroes in on the dangers of ethnocentric thinking in working with or treating people of different cultures; the Lees may have been illiterate and 'backwards' by American cultural standards, but they knew and loved their child. We end up admiring and respecting the Hmong for their warm family life and their support of each other in times of crisis, as well as respecting the medical personnel who grew as human beings as they came to recognize the Lees' humanity and their incredible strengths as parents. Many, if not most, American families would institutionalize a child such as Lia; but to her family, the sicker she became, the more precious she became. Anne Fadiman has given us an informative, excellently researched, uplifting and yet humbling book about a very special family and a very special child
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Summary: The Spirit Catches You and Then You Fall Down
Review: This book is a must read for any health care professional who cares for children. Even though the content is specific to the intersection between the Hmong and American Medical Culture, it has relevance for the intersection of Parents/Families and the American Medical Culture. I particularly appreciated the author's treatment of both sides - she gave us a picture of the people involved and the circumstances of their relationships without judgement of good or evil intent. It brings home that two people can have two very different realities in the same experience. I read this book over a weekend - not only does it teach - but it was as enjoyable as reading a work by my favorite mystery author.
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Summary: A must read for all MDs
Review: A superbly written account of why healing cannot occur in the absence of inter-cultural understanding. A pioneering medical forefront struggles with caring for a "routine" medical illness that, seen through the eyes of another culture, is far greater than its medical training had taught. Are you sure your doctor knows what you mean when you share your inner secrets with him or her? This book will ask you to consider what many of us already know -- that even the truest of medical encounters is anything but. A must read for all medical students and residents!
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Summary: clash of cultures
Review: I had to read this book for one of my classes, and I must say, it is one of the most beautifully written books I have ever had the priveledge to read. The story is of a Hmong girl w/ severe epilepsy, and the clash of the two cultures (American and Hmong)when they both try to treat her. It is a sad tale, and Fadiman's excellence in writing shines through in her objective and sympathetic recount of the story. People should read it as much for the story as for the lesson in how a book ought to be written.
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