GC: n
S: The Telegraph – https://goo.gl/XpBgNW (last access: 9 November 2017); MTALES – https://bit.ly/2DhJk0P (last access: 9 November 2017).
N: 1. Ulysses syndrome is an eponymous created from two words:
- Ulysses: the Latin form of the name Odysseus, the hero of Homer’s Greek epic poem The Odyssey. The Odyssey is one of the greatest works of classical literature and is one of two epic poems attributed to Homer.
- syndrome: “a number of symptoms occurring together,” 1540s, from medical Latin, from Greek syndrome “concurrence of symptoms, concourse of people,” from syndromos “place where several roads meet,” literally “a running together,” from syn- “with” + dromos “a running, course”. Psychological sense is from 1955.
2. Mythology: Ulysses has been away for almost 20 years, and his son, Telemachus, is searching for him. In the course of the first four books, we learn that Odysseus is alive. We heard of his exciting adventures during his ‘odyssey’ or journey. Ulysses spent 10 years trying to get back home to Ithaca after the Greeks win the Trojan War. On his way home, Ulysses and his men encounter various monsters, enchanters, and dangers.
So, the term Ulysses refers to the ancient Greek hero who spent ten years living in a distant land and another ten seeking to return to his city-state of Ithaca. The significance of Ulysses’ story is such that the term Odyssey is defined as a complex and treacherous journey in multiple languages and multiples cultures around the world.
3. The Ulysses Syndrome is a series of symptoms experienced by migrants facing chronic and multiple stressors. The identification and reduction of complication of symptoms associated with the Ulysses Syndrome pertains entirely to the areas of prevention and psychosocial wellbeing, not to the curative one. In other words, the Ulysses Syndrome is immersed in the mental health scope not in the one of the mental disorders.
4. It was Dr. Joseba Achotegui, Professor of Psychopathology and Psychotherapy at the University of Barcelona, who described a new syndrome after over two decades of working with migrants: ‘The Ulysses syndrome’. He defines as a combination of both physical symptoms and psychological ones experienced by migrants facing multiple stressors. He has focused on the often-misunderstood psychosocial challenges, including varied forms of recurring and protracted stress experienced by immigrants in their departure from the home country, and the adaptation to a different environment.
He stated that this syndrome takes place at the extreme level of stressors. The complex migration context may include factors causing high levels of stress such as: forced separation, dangers of the migratory journey, social isolation, absence of opportunities, sense of failure of the migratory goals, drop in social status, extreme struggle for survival, and discriminatory attitudes in the receiving country.
5. These factors aggravate the presence of symptoms such as: migraines, insomnia, recurrent worrying, nervousness, irritability, disorientation, fear, and gastric and osteo-physical pains. It is important to note that the multiplicity and chronicity of these factors is increased by the lack of a healthy network of social support and the inappropriate intervention of the medical system in the host country.
The stages of acculturization can be very painful for many migrants, and in the process of trying to adapt, many healthy but with chronic and multiple stress symptoms, pay the price of being misdiagnosed and unnecessarily treated as having mental disorders.
6. Under the WHO (World Health Organization): This is not an accepted mental health disorder (Classification of mental and behavioural disorders). The Ulysses Syndrome is not a mental disorder, it is a migratory extreme mourning, outside the area of psychopathology. The Ulysses Syndrome is found in the area of preventative health care and the psychosocial sector more than in the area of the treatment.
7. Cultural Interrelation: We can mention that in February 2011 the choreographer and dancer Jonah Bokaer was to perform a duet, “Replica,” in Carthage, Tunisia. The performance, significantly, would have been Mr. Bokaer’s first visit to his father’s native land. Once he returned to the United States, he began to think of his father’s time in Tunisia and imagined a dance informed by their shared history.
The result, “The Ulysses Syndrome,” in which both father and son perform, will have its United States premiere at the French Institute Alliance Française’s World Nomads: Tunisia festival.
S: 1. OED – https://bit.ly/2RzhyC1; https://bit.ly/2MSs5Yg (last access: 11 November 2017). 2. THCO – https://goo.gl/Z8qQjD (last access: 10 November 2017); TUS – https://goo.gl/6sSzmF (last access: 10 November 2017). 3. TUS – https://goo.gl/6sSzmF (last access: 9 November 2017). 4. NARRAT – https://goo.gl/guosgx (last access: 10 November 2017); TUS – https://goo.gl/6sSzmF (last access: 10 November 2017). 5. TUS – https://goo.gl/6sSzmF (last access: 10 November 2017). 6. NARRAT – https://goo.gl/guosgx (last access: 10 November 2017). 7. NYTIMES – https://nyti.ms/2D9xtS2 (last access: 11 November 2017).
SYN: immigrant syndrome with chronic and multiple stress
S: PMH – https://bit.ly/2Sm2SKZ (last access: 10 November 2017)
