Jim Crow in the Asylum

“A valuable and necessary exploration of a difficult topic, made personal through the letters and other personal accounts found in her painstaking research.”—Mississippi Books Page, Clarion-Ledger/Hattiesburg American

“By intertwining personal testimony, archival correspondence, and statistical analysis, Jim Crow in the Asylum persuasively illustrates that anti-Black racism is not an incidental bias but a foundational element of US psychiatric history. It is an important contribution to the history of medicine and disability studies.”—CHOICE

“Smith’s book is an excellent example of how to listen through archival silences in order to present an account of one of the most marginalized groups in the United States during the twentieth century.”—Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences

“This is the best mixture of careful social history with an intellectual and theoretical approach to the history of racism and psychiatry that I have seen. The book will be a model for every historian—a must-read.”—Susan M. Reverby, author of Co-Conspirator for Justice: The Revolutionary Life of Dr. Alan Berkman

“In clear, sober prose, Smith merges policy, clinical science, and patient experience to analyze racism and psychiatry’s symbiotic relationship. Working against immense silences in the archive, Smith unearths the voices of Black patients and their advocates, providing vital insight into how they faced and resisted their confinements and treatments. Jim Crow in the Asylum is required reading for anyone interested in the histories of psychiatry, the South, and race.”—Jonathan Sadowsky, Case Western Reserve University