Mental Health Past and Present

• Credit value: 30 credits at Level 7
• Convenor: Dr Sarah Marks
• Assessment: a 1000-word source analysis (25%), 1000-word book review (25%) and 4000-word essay (50%)

Mental health is a contested field, which has been shaped by social and political forces and rapid shifts in scientific and medical expertise and treatment, as well as contributions from experts by experience. The meanings and categories of mental ill health have also varied across time and place. In this intensive module we chart the history of debates and developments in the field of mental health and psychiatric/psychological practice from the birth of the asylum and the invention of psychotherapies, through de-institutionalisation, and up to the present. We will focus on cutting-edge approaches to understanding mental health in cultural and political context from the humanities and social sciences, along with key ideas from mad studies, lived experience research and transcultural psychiatry.

We will take an international approach, guiding you through the key texts on ‘Western’ psychiatry while engaging with the burgeoning literature on colonial and post-colonial contexts, and the rise of the global mental health movement. We will also contextualise contemporary mental health policy, with both local and international case studies.

This module is offered with carefully selected online content and lectures in the preparatory weeks. During an intensive week of daytime contact sessions, you will be able to participate in live seminars, and will have the opportunity to visit museum exhibitions and view curated documents in London archives through tutor-led visits, and participate in roundtable discussions with key players in the field linked with Birkbeck’s Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Mental Health.

Indicative syllabus

• The birth of the asylum and the rise of modern therapeutics
• Diagnostic categories across time and culture
• What causes mental ill health? How theories have changed over time
• Patient voice, lived experience and mental health activism
• From colonial psychiatry to global mental health
• Mental health policy: government, NGOs and stakeholders
• Contemporary debates in mental health research and practice

By the end of this module, you will:

• have a clear grasp of the development of ideas and practices in relation to mental health and how they have changed over time and across cultures
• understand how ideas and policies relating to mental health are developed in historical, cultural, economic and political context
• understand some of the key debates in contemporary mental health studies
• understand how the humanities and social sciences can contribute to our understanding of mental health
• understand the development of the service-user, survivor and lived experience movements and how these have shaped - and are shaping - knowledge, practice and policy.