Melancholy as an Alternative to the Psychological Label of Depression

Abstract

This essay questions the adequacy of theories of depression by challenging their reliance on a homeostatic model of mental health that labels all experiences of incongruity as negative. The concept of melancholy is offered as an alternative to understanding and evaluating experiential incongruity; it is a concept extracted and developed from the literature on religious studies in general and from the Hasidic stories of Elie Wiesel in particular.