Relooking at Symbols & Signs

In my Human Resource class last week, we read a Case Study about a woman who had a maniac episode. This woman's story reminded me of Symbols and Signs. She kept seeing meaning in everything around her even though not all of the meanings seemed to be connected, at least not to me. It was interesting to try and see the episode from her point of view. When reading Symbols and Signs, we only have the opportunity to see things from the Mother and Father perspective but what about the son's? Does he want to be in the hospital? Does he think that he needs help or is he more himself because he has the knowledge that the others lack? I certainly do not know the answers to these questions but I think that they bear pondering.

Who should decide when someone else is not normal or sane? How can we define what these two things are? If you are to subscribe to the idea of the collective unconscious (and I do) then how do we know that these people just haven't been able to reach a deeper level of knowledge than I have access to?

As I am siting here looking around the library, I wonder how many people in this room would think I am crazy for my obsession with mythology and Eleusinian Mysteries? How many of these people would think that James Joyce was crazy as I once did but now he has become one of the most brilliant men that I wish I could have met. I have seen other people become so excited about lasers, chemistry, and the workings of the human body. Personally I see no appeal in these things but maybe I just don't have access to the knowledge that makes them interesting. Is one type of person more sane than another? No I don't think so. I think that maybe sanity shouldn't be questioned. Instead maybe we should start looking to see the knowledge that people possess to show their importance as humans. Now I am not trying to say that there shouldn't be places like the ones that Nabokov wrote about. I think that these are needed to make sure that people do not harm themselves, others, or if people need others to take care of them. I just think that the classification of crazy, insane, or whatever similar term you want to use should stop. Because the people who we may classify as crazy may just have more knowledge than the rest of us. I can truly believe that this knowledge could cause someone to not be able to make complete sense to other people without the same knowledge.