Citation

Abbott A. Sociol. Relig. 1980; 41(2): 164-171.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1980, Association for the Sociology of Religion)

DOI

10.2307/3709909

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

A common assertion holds that psychiatrists inherited from the clergy the interpretation and control of individual problems with everyday life. This paper questions that view on several grounds, drawing on American evidence from the period 1875-1935. First, such problems were extensively handled by non-clergy professionals in the nineteenth century. Second, psychiatry remained numerically miniscule until after the Second World War. Third, early clergy pastoral theory saw everyday life problems instrumentally, as aids to salvation. While later pastoral theories did propose direct interpretation and control of everyday life problems, these theories were in fact psychiatrically inspired. Thus, while the "inheritor theory" may hold at some deep functional level, it should not be hypostatized to define an actual historical process of displacement.