The Ulysses Syndrome

Racialisation and Meditation in Mental Health Processes

An Everyday Life Psychology Essay on Mental Health and Migration Flows

By Daniel Vinas Malo (Studienr. 73645)

For Rashmi Singla (Lecturer)

Autumn Semester 2023

Subject module course 3: Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology E2023 09.10.2023 - 12.10.2023

Table of contents

Introduction - p. 1

Analysis - pp. 2 - 3

Conclusion - p. 4

Figures - p. 4

Bibliography - p. 4
Subject module course 3: Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology E2023 09.10.2023 - 12.10.2023

Introduction

The displacement of population from the ongoing emergencies in all the continents informs the situations
suffered by these communities not only during the migratory process but across the whole context of the
migratory happening. Migration flows are of multipolar origin. Some might be influenced by political and social
menaces, others might come from an economy driven urgence, or other diverse emergencies that shake the
individual’s life as to leave the comfort of their homeland and travel to distant places. Migratory flows have been
constant over the course of History. From the iced-powered mass migrations through the Bering Strait to the
conflict-driven refugees crisis of the 21st century; however little has been explored concerning the mental
manœuvres that migrants must deal with.

Fig. 1. De Chirico, Giorgio (1968) The return of Ulysses. Oil on canvas.

The Basque psychiatrist Joseba Achotegui Loizate, currently employed at the SAPPIR (Spanish acronym for the
Psychopathology and Psychosocial Attention Service) of the Sant Pere Claver Hospital and professor of the Barcelona
University coined the term "Ulysses Syndrome" in 2022. The "Multiple and Chronic Stress of the Immigrant
Syndrome" or "Ulysses Syndrome" is characterised by several metal stressors that include somatic and psychic
factors and by the experiencing of psycho-processes such as grief and depression. Contrary to the Odyssean
character from which the naming of this syndrome is derived; the modern Ulysses does not return to Ithaca but
flows away never to return. Then how does psychology work with migrants nowadays?

There are two topics that can be explored critically from which contemporary psychology can exhibit the
problematics and opportunities of mental health practices coming to the migratory flows of the 21st century and
its circumstances: Racialisation processes and the deterioration of mental health in European detention centres and
Meditation practises: methods, usages, and outcomes of mindfulness between East and West.

To insist on these two topics is not trivial but of a pivotal importance in order to understand the influences of the
global mental health declive and the chances of repairing the broken ties between receptor and new-comer in the
migration scenario from a perspective that many times has been purposefully omitted for the sake of keeping the
systemic endorsement of power categorisation among human groups.
Subject module course 3: Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology E2023 09.10.2023 - 12.10.2023

Analysis

Racialisation processes and the deterioration of mental health in European detention centres

According to sociology, racialisation is the processes that situate “the alien” in an “othered position” through the
lenses of colourism derived from colonialist theorisation concerning the phenotypes and the categorisation of
personalities and archetypes based on geographical location of different communities. Such is the circumstance
of the numerous sub-saharan migrants that reach the border of the European Union and seek to jump the fence.
The fact that these migrants face a double-edge emergency is crystal clear: they are often classified as dangerous
coloured migrants, and moreover they are illegally trespassing the sovereign borders of a European country. The
conjunction of both preconceived characteristics, action, and legal consequences has a detrimental outcome for
the disfavoured young immigrants (population that usually are in their quarter of life by European standards).

Fig. 2. Sub-saharan immigrants on top of the fence between Morocco and Melilla (Spain)

Not only do the practices of misinformation play an important role, the purpose of the psychosocial intervention
can be proved fatal for the immigrant community. If we dare to look at the situation of the Special Centres for
Immigrants all across the European continent, one can see the prevalence of mental health issues among the
immigrant inmates; cases of depression and anxiety are easily found given the circumstances and practices that
take place inside these institutions. As anti-racist psychiatrist Suman Fernando exposes, concerning this issue in
the United Kingdom: when I was in psychiatric practice, a sentiment I heard from some of the black patients who were
sectioned (compulsorily detained) and given forcible medication, was that ‘it’s like slavery’, meaning that the psychiatry they
1
experienced felt like the experience of slavery (or what they envisaged it to be).” Here, in an almost translucent way, one
can envision the parallelisms that can be drawn between the historicity of slavery and the condition of
master–slave found in some psychiatric models. The existence of mental health conditions can be easily used by
the psychiatric institutions to predate immigrants that risk imprisonment and deportation, aggravating their
mental and physical condition. The well-known case of Bingzhi Zhu, a Chinese student enrolled in a master’s at
Copenhagen University is very illustrative and exemplary. After experiencing a growing stress due to not
fulfilling the requirements for her to stay in the country due to the Danish administration's closedness, the latent
anti-Chinese furor due to Covid-19 pandemic in Western countries, and several episodes of stress, anxiety, and
depression, Binghi Zhu, as the University of Copenhagen Post echoes: “was arrested by the police because her
residence permit had expired. The policemen considered her to be mentally unstable and unfit for questioning and drove her

1
Fernando, S. (2017) Institutional Racism in Psychiatry and Clinical Psychology: Race Matters in Mental Health Basingstoke: Palgrave
Macmillan. Chapter: Persistence of Racism through White Power. pp. 135- 152
Subject module course 3: Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology E2023 09.10.2023 - 12.10.2023

to the police station where she spent the night. She was subsequently transported to Vestre prison. She stayed at both the
Psychiatric Centre Amager and the psychiatric centre at Bispebjerg Hospital before a stay at the deportation centre
2
Ellebæk, which she describes as traumatic. On 2 February, she flew from Denmark to China, where she is at present” . Here
one can observe how the enforcement of racist and anti-immigratory practices still holds foot in countries that
are deemed progressive such as Denmark and how the usage of the inability to defend yourself given a certain
unfit mental state can be used to the detriment of human rights.

Meditation practises: methods, usages, and outcomes of mindfulness between East and West

Meditation as a daily life (conscious) activity is one of the multifaceted mindfulness practices that came into the
West. Certain studies such as the one made in Denmark by Ebdrup in 2011 signal the efficiency of mindfulness
practices dealing with psycho-physical diseases such as psoriasis, stress, depression, phobias, etc. However, the
dilemmas of bringing practices such as Buddhist meditation to a Western psychological understanding are
problematic, given the aim of Western contemporary psychology to align itself with the scientific method that
excludes other practices and deem them as anti-scientific. The rationalisation of psychology includes the
disparagement of Eastern psychological-driven practices. However, certain practices have been historically
shared. The case of power spots is interesting as to illustrate the connections established between both West and
east traditions of ritualisation of spaces. A power spot (パワースポット or pawa-supotto in Japanese) is an area where
people can charge their spiritual energy batteries. These places have been traditionally associated with residences
of spirits, usually located in the mountainous landscapes of rural Japan, however as industrialisation took place,
new forms of “power spots” are to be found inside the city limits.

Fig. 3. A Japanese power spot. 清正井 (Kiyomasa Well). 明治神宮 ( Meiji Jingū). Tokyo, Japan.

Power Spots (or power vortexes) have been re-appreciated all across the European continent; Stonehenge being one
of the most celebrated due to its relation to the ancient practices of the Celtic druids. The surge of the practice of
the pilgrimage and meditation in these places are nevertheless a proof of the integration of traditional, healing
measures that have been reintroduced in the everyday life activities of the common people through the works of
meditation experts during the decade of the sixties and seventies in the New Age movements in the Western
world. Meditative practices such as mindfulness can be understood as an “art of experiencing life”; these practices
originated in the East, make use of the psychosocial understandings of both cultural dimensions to prevent, help,
and to improve the quality of life of the everyday person and have seen positive results over the course of the last
decades in psychological research investigations and mental health promotion associations and institutions.

2
https://uniavisen.dk/en/copenhagen-student-ended-up-at-deportation-facility-sent-home-to-china/
Subject module course 3: Developmental, Personality and Social Psychology E2023 09.10.2023 - 12.10.2023

Conclusion

Drawing from the comments that have been explored across this paper, one can infer that the upbringing of new,
alternative ways of mediation between the migratory problematics and mental health must be analysed and
contextualised under the lenses of contemporary psychology’s ways that might incorporate different reasonings
and optics that allow the betterment of people’s everyday lives.

Figures

(Cover) Dixon, Maynard (1945) Study for Migration. Watercolour. Private ownership.

Fig. 1. De Chirico, Giorgio (1968) The return of Ulysses. Oil on canvas.

Fig. 2. Sub-saharan immigrants on top of the fence between Morocco and Melilla (Spain)
Fig. 3. A Japanese power spot. 清正井 (Kiyomasa Well). 明治神宮 ( Meiji Jingū). Tokyo, Japan.

Bibliography

From the course

Fernando, S. (2017) Institutional Racism in Psychiatry and Clinical Psychology: Race Matters in Mental Health
Basingstoke. Palgrave Macmillan. Chapter: Persistence of Racism through White Power. pp. 135- 152.
Singla, R. (2011) Origins of Mindfulness & Meditation: Interplay of Eastern & Western Psychology. Psyke & Logos NR.1,
Årgang 32. pp 220-239.

Other sources

Achotegui Loizate, Joseba. (2020) The Ulysses Syndrome: against the dehumanisation of migration (Spanish Edition)
Nuevos Emprendimientos Editoriales.
García Campayo, Javier. (2005) Mental Health and Immigration (with M. Alda). (Spanish Edition) Editorial Edika
Med.
García Campayo, Javier. (2018) What do we know about Mindfulness? (with Marcelo Demarzo). (Spanish Edition).
Editorial Kairós.
https://uniavisen.dk/en/copenhagen-student-ended-up-at-deportation-facility-sent-home-to-china/