The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures
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The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
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Narrated by:
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Pamela Xiong
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By:
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Anne Fadiman
About this listen
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction
When three-month-old Lia Lee arrived at the county hospital emergency room in Merced, California, a chain of events was set in motion from which neither she nor her parents nor her doctors would ever recover. Lia's parents, Foua and Nao Kao, were part of a large Hmong community in Merced, refugees from the CIA-run "Quiet War" in Laos. The Hmong, traditionally a close-knit people, have been less amenable to assimilation than most immigrants, adhering steadfastly to the rituals and beliefs of their ancestors. Lia's pediatricians, Neil Ernst and his wife, Peggy Philip, cleaved just as strongly to another tradition: that of Western medicine.
When Lia Lee entered the American medical system, diagnosed as an epileptic, her story became a tragic case history of cultural miscommunication. Parents and doctors both wanted the best for Lia, but their ideas about the causes of her illness and its treatment could hardly have been more different. The Hmong see illness and healing as spiritual matters linked to virtually everything in the universe while medical community marks a division between body and soul and concerns itself almost exclusively with the former.
Lia's doctors ascribed her seizures to the misfiring of her cerebral neurons; her parents called her illness qaug dab peg - the spirit catches you and you fall down - and ascribed it to the wandering of her soul. The doctors prescribed anticonvulsants; her parents preferred animal sacrifices.
©1997 Anne Fadiman, Afterword copyright 2012 by Anne Fadiman (P)2015 Audible Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
What listeners say about The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance3 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- A R
- 07-11-21
Frustrating narrator
While this is an excellent book, it’s really let down by the narrator who mispronounces every word with an apostrophe, e.g. ‘family’s’ as ‘family’ses’, and ‘doctor’s’ as ‘doctor’ses’. This might seem minor but there are thousands of instances of this and it is wearing.
I’d recommend reading this yourself and not getting the audiobook.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Mr. Joel Symonds
- 26-05-23
Amazing story, horribly told.
The book itself is outstanding, however the narrator is incapable of pronouncing common English words, doesn’t understand how plural possessive apostrophes work (adds an extra “es”, so “brothers’” becomes “brotherses” and the Lee family is referred to as “The Leeses”.
It’s apparent on several occasions that the publishers haven’t consulted a medical consultant in the recording, leading to many clinical terms being mispronounced, or entirely rewritten (in one example, the term “venous cutdown” is changed to “venous countdown”). Her pronunciation of encephalopathy is a baffling cocktail of Fs and Ths, “enselleffaothathy”.
Read the book, but don’t do it as an audio recording.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance2 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Lou Tribus
- 21-03-18
An Amazing Story, badly let down by the Narrator
What did you like most about The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down?
This is a fascinating and well written story giving the reader a unique view of a community, its culture and the difficulties of being an immigrant.
The author paints a sympathetic, moving and compelling picture of the people and their circumstances.
Who was your favorite character and why?
No specific character was my favourite
How did the narrator detract from the book?
I found the narrator's voice annoying. Her attempt to represent the Mhong Chinese by using a Chinese accent was condescending. I was surprised and disappointed at the number of words she mispronounced. Some examples:
She pronounced "indigent patients" as "indignant patients". Every time she came across the plural possessive form, such as "Patients' concerns", she pronounced it as though it has an "es" on the end "Patientses concerns". Acolytes became "acolytees", arduous became "orderus". prevalence became "pre-vale-ence". I have many more examples.
The quality of the narration does not do justice to this interesting and moving book.
Did you have an emotional reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
Both. Very moving.
Any additional comments?
I have recommended this book to everyone I know. However I have told them to buy the paper copy, not this audiobook. I can't say strongly enough how badly the narration has let the author down.
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2 people found this helpful