One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest Sociology

Hospitals are meant to help some people heal physically and others mentally. In the novel One Who Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey published in 1962, readers are introduced to a mental hospital that has goals that do not align with helping people. Within the hospital, characters with varied personalities and opinions are intermixed with three main characters playing specific roles with supporting characters close by. With the characters’ motivations, themes develop such as the emasculation of the men in the hospital by an oppressive nurse. Symbols, such as laughter and the “combine”, are also pertinent to themes as the readers watch the men transitioning from being oppressed to being able to stand up for themselves causing change in hospital policy.

Meaning that he would believe that the patients following rules prior to McMurphy’s arrival and showing respect for the staff of the ward is what led to order in the institution for so long. After his arrival this no longer applied, as McMurphy showed no respect for the staff, especially Nurse Ratched, who he often had many negative exchanges with. He also would not follow the rules as the other patients would, and challenged them in an attempt to change them, rather than showing respect and following them. This lead to the initial order of the institution being put to an end. However, McMurphy’s actions had caused the deterioration of the ward and the mental state of the patients in many other ways.

Nurse Ratchet held in place an extensive system of rules and regulations, as well as an ordered routine. McMurphy taught the patients that sometimes it is acceptable to rebel against the rules and that they do not have to rely on their schedule to keep their minds together. For example, McMurphy states “Is that what your schedule does for you?” (Forman One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest Film). The schedule is a part of the institutionalization of power that Nurse Ratched employs to maintain control and keep the patients compliant to her sense of order. McMurphy points out that it is in fact a sham that cannot cover the messiness of real life. Obviously, they all realize that the schedule is only a made up method for arranging time. Be that as it may, none of them have ever been able to admit it.

As soon as McMurphy arrives on the ward, he challenges Nurse Ratched’s abusive regime in hopes of restoring humanity and the rights of the individual. It didn’t take long

Throughout history there has been a veil of mystery surrounding what truly goes on inside of asylums. This idea is illustrated clearly in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest on multiple occasions. One example can be seen when R.P. McMurphy takes to writing letters to people he knows in order to get them to ask questions about what is really going on. By doing so, he hopes to reveal the truth behind the world he finds himself in. Additionally, in the world of McMurphy, electroshock therapy is still being used. However, this type of therapy was being used less as a cure for illness, and more as a form of discipline, punishment, and pain infliction. According to Weitz in chapter

The story One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey describes a 1950’s Oregon mental hospital that is administered by a cruel and abusive nurse named Miss. Ratched was inspired by Kesey’s own experience observing patients in a mental hospital. The 1950’s were a time of increasing social change and development culminating in movements such as the civil rights and sexual revolution movements of the 60’s. The novel ties sexual liberation to personal freedoms and shows that being able to manage one's behavior and choices is a sign of independence. In One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest Ken Kesey persuades us to share the same worldview through use of language and perspective, showing us the importance of freedom and the impact of society on what freedoms we allow ourselves to have.

Kesey uses Nurse Ratched to embody the emphasis American culture at the time put on conformity. When Nurse Ratched has the most control over the ward she concentrates on keeping the patients on a strict schedule and preparing them to go back into society. Chief Bromden claims Nurse Ratched dreams of a world of precision, efficiency and tidiness (Kesey 29). The Chief is convinced the mental ward is a factory for the Combine (Kesey 40). He believes the Combine is society as a whole and the ward is the place where people are sent if they are not fitting in to be fixed. Chief believes Nurse Ratched’s goal is to fix the mistakes made in the everyday lives of the patients and send them back out into the world better than they were before (Kesey 40). He

was also the one who enabled the patients to use the tub room for card games,

During the movie One flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, there were several instances of status hierarchy, Adjustment, depersonalization, and Institutionalization. A Status hierarchy symbol is the nurses station and a fall of status hierarchy was when Nurse Ratchet got her nurses cap back dirty at the end of the movie. They show adjustment in the movie with the lack of letting them watch the world series. Some of the ways ward depersonalized the patients was by rationing out the cigarettes after Mac's gambling stint, wearing the same clothes, taking medication at a set time, and the extreme of Mac's Lobotomy. Institutionalization is shown where Mac finds out that a lot of the ward is in their because of free will.

“Screws fall out, the world is an imperfect place.” –The Breakfast Club. This quote captures the theme of the movie of a flawed society in which cliques override human nature. The Breakfast Club is a timeless movie as it shows a social hierarchy, human intuition, and the inevitable imperfections of life that will always live on our world.

Conformity has been the target of many works of literature even before Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye spewed angst about everyone around him being a “phony.” To many people, there are forces in the social order that shape others to fit a certain mold, and one who does not fit the mold will be considered an outcast by society. During the 1960’s, rebellion was a shared act among the majority, including authors and artists; this was due to the conflict in the East as well as the Civil Rights movement. To these people, the government was a criminal, even a machine perhaps, which threatened one’s individuality. This provides some historical context on the background of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. Ken Kesey, the author, worked in

“People don't want other people to get high, because if you get high, you might see the falsity of the fabric of the society we live in.” This quote by Ken Kesey embodies his view of society in the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s nest. He depicts the modern society through Nurse Ratched, a strong authoritarian figure, that embellishes the nature of society. Nurse Ratched is notorious in her endeavors to control the men and uses her power to regulate the men. In this domain the beams of society cause the men to shrink from individual freedom that is reawakened with McMurphy, who teaches the men to be bold in the face of society. In Kesey’s work he highlights several major ideas about society. He illustrates the repressive nature of society that causes men to conform to boundaries. Further, he depicts how society rejects those who are deemed defective in the system. Lastly, he also illustrates how society is a major cause of shame and indignity. Thus, Kensey delineates the nature of society as being repressive, selective, and a cause of diffidence.

The author of the novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Keasey, received his inspiration for the book while volunteering at a veteran's hospital. This is where he was first introduced to LSD. The moment he tried it, he became addicted, and began experimenting on himself with the drugs, observing the effects. The novel deals with the tyrannical rule of head Nurse Ratched in a mental hospital somewhere in Oregon. She runs all business and daily life in the asylum to her every whim and rules the ward by fear and manipulation. This has gone on for as long as the narrator, Chief Bromden, can remember. However a new patient, Randle McMurphy, enters the hospital and begins to wreak havoc upon the system

Our perspective of a stranger whom we’ve never met nor seen, but only heard of through the mouth of the enemy’s opinion, will inevitably align with the only version of the story we’ve heard. This sort of bias is found in Ken Kesey’s 1962 novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, with Nurse Ratched’s depiction through the narration by Chief Bromden. The reliability of Bromden’s perspective is questionable, as it is his interpretation of the world, rather than what it actually is.

We feel that One Flew over the Cuckoo’s nest is filled with many psychological connotations. This movie is set in a mental hospital where McMurphy was admitted to be psychologically evaluated because of violent behavior. Upon his arrival McMurphy noticed that the patients were very robot-like in their actions. The hospital is extremely structured where the patient’s daily life was monotonous. We will discuss the various connotations by answering the following questions that have been asked.