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For nearly half a century, historical arguments have played a major role in the controversies that have animated researchers who study schizophrenia. Their work, which is underpinned by very varied approaches, makes little or no room for the patients’ personal journeys. However, by looking at the history of this diagnosis from the point of view of those concerned, that is, by passing from a medical approach to a social approach, the advent of schizophrenia can be seen in a new light. Based on three life stories and recalling that the category has long been criticized, this article proposes another history of schizophrenia. It demonstrates that the notion’s longevity is not due to its scientific soundness—criticized since the first decades of the twentieth century—but to its social and institutional function. The diagnostic label emerged at a precise moment in the history of madness, psychiatry, and society. It allowed the designation of young people unadapted to modernity, the refounding of psychiatric knowledge on a biological approach, and the relegation of the uprooted who failed to emancipate themselves, as well as patients resistant to the technical and institutional advances of psychiatry. It is a functional and useful diagnostic label, a medical convenience that has lasted for more than a century, despite its weak scientific basis and the recurrent controversies surrounding it.