Revisiting the Allan Memorial Institute, 1943-1967

Type of resource
Author/collaborator
Title
Revisiting the Allan Memorial Institute, 1943-1967
Abstract
The author points out that most of the historical research into the "de-patterning" experiments on unconsenting psychiatric patients who were patients at McGill University's Allan Memorial Institute in Montreal in the mid-twentieth century focuses on the role that funding received from the American CIA and military played in these studies. The author's research focuses on the larger funding received by the Allan Memorial from Canadian mental health grants for these experiments. The patients who underwent these experiments were induced into comas for weeks, subject to electroshock, forced to take LSD and other psychedelic drugs, and played looped repetitions of audio recordings aimed at “de-patterning” them in order to create a blank slate of their brains. The goal of these experiments was supposedly to understand and develop methods for brainwashing in response to Cold War fears of the communists brainwashing North American soldiers. Through the experiments, subjects suffered irreparable damage, incapable of recovery. Some left the Allan Memorial with severely impaired abilities to form new memories and/or no memory of their lives prior to entering the institute – unable to recall their parents, spouses, children, or lives they had once led.
Date
June 2019
Proceedings Title
Proceedings of the 38th CASAE Annual Conference / Actes de la 38ème ACÉÉA conférence annuelle
Place
University of British Columbia, Vancouver BC
Publisher
Canadian Association for the Study of Adult Education / Association canadienne pout l'étude de l'éducation des adultes
Pages
113-118
Language
en
ISBN
978-0-920056-52-3
URL
Citation
Gold, Efrat. “Revisiting the Allan Memorial Institute, 1943-1967.” In Proceedings of the 38th CASAE Annual Conference / Actes de La 38ème ACÉÉA Conférence Annuelle, 113–118. University of British Columbia, Vancouver BC: Canadian Association for the Study of Adult Education / Association canadienne pout l’étude de l’éducation des adultes, 2019. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Roula_N_Hawa/publication/340428385_Art_as_Lived_Art_for_Life_In_JP_Egan_Ed_Proceedings_of_the_38th_Canadian_Association_for_the_Study_of_Adult_Education_CASAEACEEA_Annual_Conference_pp_46-53_Vancouver_British_Columbia_Canada_June_1-4/links/5e8819964585150839bd4192/Art-as-Lived-Art-for-Life-In-JP-Egan-Ed-Proceedings-of-the-38th-Canadian-Association-for-the-Study-of-Adult-Education-CASAE-ACEEA-Annual-Conference-pp-46-53-Vancouver-British-Columbia-Canada-June.pdf#page=124.
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