Murder by Death: Renfield Syndrome

What is a psychiatric disorder? How do you distinguish madness from normal behaviour? The nomenklatura of American psychiatry follow a be fruitful-and-multiply approach, with every edition of the DSM – the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual – proffering a dazzling array of new conditions. Where these disorders arise is a matter of contentious debate with a strong school of thought contending that they emerge, not from decades of careful clinical observation, but the exigencies of an organising committee with its accompanying politics. This is hardly a good way for a behavioural science to progress, but unwittingly perpetuates a postmodern trope where truth is a dubious entity.