Mad Studies Reader

Bradley Lewis is a psychiatrist and psychotherapist with a background in the arts and humanities. He is Associate Professor at New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study and he is on the editorial board of the Journal of Medical Humanities. His books include Moving Beyond Prozac, DSM, and the New Psychiatry: The Birth of Postpsychiatry; Narrative Psychiatry: How Stories Can Shape Clinical Encounters; and Experiencing Epiphanies in Literature, Cinema, and Everyday Life (forthcoming).Alisha Ali is Associate Professor in the Department of Applied Psychology at New York University. Her research focuses on the mental health effects of oppression, including violence, racism, discrimination, and trauma. She is the co-editor of the book Silencing the Self Across Cultures (Oxford University Press) as well as the co-editor of The Crisis of Connection (NYU Press).Jazmine Russell is the co-founder of the Institute for the Development of Human Arts (IDHA), a transformative mental health training institute, and host of Depth Work: A Holistic Mental Health Podcast. She is an interdisciplinary scholar of mad studies, critical psychology, and neuroscience, with experience working both within and outside the mental health system.

• Introducing Mad Studies Part I. Innovative Artists Introduction 1. “National Association for the Eradication of Mental Illness” and “Taking Care of the Basics” 2. Mad Studies and Mad Positive Music 3. Woody Guthrie’s Brain 4. The Invisible Line of Madness 5. Cry Havoc: The Madness of Returning Home from War 6. Betty and Veronica 7. The Uses of Depression: The Way Around is Through 8. Inbetweenland 9. Sometimes/I Slip 10. The Mystery of Madness through Art and Mad Studies 11. Mad Art Makes Sense 12. Are You Conrad? Part II. Critical Scholars Introduction 13. Theoretical Considerations in Mad Studies 14. Obsession in Our Time 15. A (Head) Case for Mad Humanities: Sula’s Shadrack and Black Madness 16. How to Go Mad without Losing Your Mind: Notes toward a Mad Methodology 17. Commercialized Science and Epistemic Injustice: Exposing and Resisting Neoliberal Global Mental Health Discourse 18. ‘Structural Competency’ meets Mad Studies: Reckoning with madness and mental diversity beyond the social determinants of mental health 19. The Neoliberal Project: Mental Health and Marginality in India 20. Child as Metaphor: Colonialism, Psy-Goverance, and Epistemicide 21. Beyond Disordered Brains and Mother Blame: Critical Issues in Autism and Mothering 22. Enacting Activism: Depathologizing Trauma in Military Veterans Through Theatre Part III. Concerned Clinicians Introduction 23. Mental Illness is Still a Myth 24. The Emergence UK Critical Psychiatry Network: Reflections and Themes 25. Crisis Response as a Human Rights Flashpoint: Critical Elements of Community Support for Individuals Experiencing Significant Emotional Distress 26. Sanism: Histories, Applications, and Studies So Far 27. On Being Insane in Sane Places: Breaking into the Cult of Sanity 28. Therapy as a Tool in Dismantling Oppression 29. Decolonizing Psychotherapy by Owning Our Madness 30. Creating a Cultural Foundation for Spiritual Emergence 31. The Establisment and the Mystic 32. Re-thinking Psychiatry with Mad Studies Part IV. Daring Activists Introduction 33. The Ex-Patients' Movement: Where We've Been and Where We're Going 34. The Icarus Project: A Counter Narrative for Psychic-Diversity 35. Ending Coerción 36. Language games used to construct autism as pathology 37. The Black Wisdom Collective 38. Mad Resistance/Mad Alternatives: Democratizing Mental Health Care 39. Black Resilience in the Face of Bullshit: Wellness & Safety Plan 40. Demolition, Abolition, and the Legacy of Madness 41. A Brief, Critical History of Mental Health Services in Uganda and introduction to Contemporary Human Rights Organizing and Reform 42. Letter to the Mother of a “Schizophrenic”: We Must Do Better Than Forced Treatment 43. With the Launch of Mad in Denmark, a Global Network for Radical Change Grows Stronger 44. Defunding Sanity 45. Making the Case for Multiplicity: A Holistic Framework for Madness & Transformation

"The Mad Studies Reader brings the world of mental health together with the world of critical intellectual scholarship and activism. It is invaluable reading that works out the central problem of sanism in the way we treat mental differences. I have no doubt it will be an instant classic and a 'go to' resource for people in the mad pride movement, disability studies, health humanities, narrative medicine, arts for health, critical mental health, and anyone interested in the complexities of today’s mental health concerns."Danielle Spencer, PhD, Program in Narrative Medicine, Columbia University and author of Metagnosis: Revelatory Narratives of Health and Identity"In the relentless quest for liberation, echoes have resonated through time—voices of scholars, storytellers, and activists narrating the tale of defiance. The Mad Studies Reader stands as a testament within the tapestry of social justice movements embroiled in this struggle for emancipation. For me, its arrival marks a critical juncture, a turning tide where the silenced voices of society's marginalized find amplification. Mad people being recognized as bearers of transformative wisdom capable of reshaping our world."Vesper Moore, Activist and host of GET MAD! podcast devoted to transformative mental health, mad pride, and disability justice"So many questions: Do medical models want to eradicate mental illness? What is anti-psychiatry? Could depression be poetry? What does epistemic justice look like for mental health? Does capitalism fuel mental illness? In response to these questions and many more, The Mad Studies Reader is what our futuristic-politocized-neurodivergent-justice-fueled-(re)educational process needs to look like."Jennifer Mullin, PhD, Psychotherapist and author of Decolonizing Therapy: Oppression, Historical Trauma, and Politicizing your Practice“A groundbreaking cornucopia of art, activism, and critical thought. Required reading for artists, students, scholars and anyone interested in mental health.”Jussi Valtonen, PhD, Novelist and psychologist, They Know Not What They Do