Category: Background Reading

Mad Artists’ Gallery

Mad Artists’ Gallery Takeaways Appreciate the importance of art-making and creative self-expression as a healing practice for racialized mad people who often have adverse experiences in the traditional mental health system Understand art as a form of activist engagement with, and critique of, interlocking systems of oppression Recognize the value of art-making as a medium …

‘Claiming Space’

The ‘Claiming Space’ Unit Takeaways Analyse the diverse experiences of oppression and exclusion that exist for mad people across race, gender, class, culture and sexuality. Understand the importance of equitable political and community engagement and representation.  Explore how power affects racialized youth’s experiences of mental distress in a range of contexts and the importance of …

Disappearing Completely

Disappearing Completely Takeaways Understand how the intersecting oppression of racism and sanism within mental health systems and in the community affect racialized people experiencing mental distress Analyze the intersections of race, gender, citizenship and mental distress for racialized people in Canada Appreciate the impacts of cultural expectations, stereotyping, and racism on individuals’ experiences of mental …

The “Inexplicable Maze”

The “Inexplicable Maze” Unit Takeaways Recognize that the mental health system is structured to enforce racism, sexism, sanism, and other forms of oppression Understand the effects of trying to navigate a system that has been created and mobilized to oppress, negate, and abuse those who are already marginalized Appreciate the importance of intersectional resistance and …

Psychiatric Hollywood

Psychiatric Hollywood Takeaways Recognize how emotions can motivate us to engage with ourselves, our own beliefs, and others through self-reflection and dialogue Acknowledge how diagnosis and treatment can stigmatize and oppress marginalized groups and survivors of trauma Understand how fiction and non-fiction art can participate in bearing witness and storytelling Components Psychiatric Hollywood Audio Series …

The ‘days’

The ‘days’ Unit Takeaways Appreciate the connection between art and healing Value of the role of art as an alternative to, or combined with, mental health care Understand the importance of creative self-expression for conveying the complexity of lived experience at the intersections of madness, race, gender, and sexuality Recognize the importance of creating a …

Tools for Recovery

Tools for Recovery Unit Takeaways Recognize the importance of peer support in developing coping strategies and new skill sets Value creativity and community engagement as pathways to confidence and wellbeing Acknowledge systemic barriers to recovery Component The component for this unit is a recovery memoir by community expert Margo Robinson setting out what she thinks …

Designing Dementia Care

Designing Dementia Care Unit Takeaways Recognize that the inherent ageism in our society permeates policy and practice Appreciate the need to create residential care facilities that afford full and dignified lives for older adults with cognitive or physical limitations Understand that in an institutional setting, the conditions of care and the conditions of work are …

Speaking to History

Speaking to History: Mental Health Policy Unit Takeaways Understand the circumstances and ideas that informed deinstitutionalization policies and how they shaped day-to-day practice and the lives of service users Identify the ways in which restrictions and discipline characteristic of the earlier long-stay mental health hospitals have been reproduced in the bureaucratized mental health and social …

Question Man

Question Man Unit Takeaways Appreciate that patients may experience mental health services as oppressive and soul-destroying Understand the importance of practitioners working with patients to help reclaim strengths and strategies that were part of their identity before they experienced mental health difficulties Value voice, resiliency, resistance and experiential knowledge in supporting good mental health Component …