Ghaemi, S. Nassir 1966-

PERSONAL:

Born August 19, 1966, in Tehran, Iran; naturalized U.S. citizen; son of Kamal (a physician) and Guity (an art historian) Ghaemi; married Heather Elizabeth Hewitt (a social worker), October 10, 1998; children: Valentine Zand, Seyyed Zane MacPherson. Ethnicity: "Iranian." Education: George Mason University, B.A., 1986; Medical College of Virginia, M.D., 1990; Tufts University, M.A., 2001. Politics: Democrat. Religion: Shiite Muslim. Hobbies and other interests: Travel, the Red Sox.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Atlanta, GA. Office— Department of Psychiatry, Emory University, 1365 Clifton Rd., Bldg. B, Ste. 6100, Atlanta, GA 30322. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

George Washington University, Washington, DC, research assistant professor of psychiatry, 1996- 98; Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, assistant professor of psychiatry, 1998-2005; Emory University, Atlanta, GA, associate professor of psychiatry, 2005—.

MEMBER: International Society for Bipolar Disorders (officer, 1999—), American Psychiatric Association (distinguished fellow), Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry (member of executive committee, 1990—).

AWARDS, HONORS:

Karl Jaspers Prize, Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry, 1993, for a paper written as a psychiatric resident; distinguished resident research award, American Psychiatric Association, 1994; outstanding service award, Virginia Alliance for the Mentally Ill, 1997.

WRITINGS:

(Editor) Polypharmacy in Psychiatry, Marcel Dekker (New York, NY), 2002.

The Concepts of Psychiatry: A Pluralistic Approach to the Mind and Mental Illness, Johns Hopkins University Press (Baltimore, MD), 2003.

Mood Disorders: A Practical Guide, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins (Philadelphia, PA), 2003.

Contributor to more than thirty books. Contributor of more than 100 articles to medical journals.

SIDELIGHTS:

S. Nassir Ghaemi told CA: "I went into psychiatry because I wanted to understand people, both scientifically and humanistically. I have been writing more in the humanistic vein after about a decade of scientific research. My background includes a degree in philosophy and a later degree in public health, and thus I have begun to focus on the philosophical and social aspects of psychiatry, most extensively in my book The Concepts of Psychiatry: A Pluralistic Approach to the Mind and Mental Illness. This book is heavily influenced by the ideas of Karl Jaspers more than those of any other thinker, but also by the work of the pragmatic American philosophers (particularly William James and Charles Sanders Pierce). I also have personally been mentored and influenced by the philosopher Daniel Dennett. I hope to continue my philosophically oriented work about the nature of the mind and mental illness. Also, my personal background as an Iranian and a Muslim has led me to further study Islam and, given the current political climate, I plan to expand my work into Islamic intellectual history."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, March, 2005, Andres Martin, review of The Concepts of Psychiatry: A Pluralistic Approach to the Mind and Mental Illness, p. 298.

Psychiatric Times, February 1, 2003, review of Polypharmacy in Psychiatry, p. 51.