International Health Humanities Network: Blog Entries by Keyword

Well done to Anna Harpin, Juliet Foster and team in running this successful two-day conference funded by AHRC.  I thoroughly enjoyed the programme of speakers, not least because so many different scholars (and disciplines) were represented.  In particular, I was delighted to note the variety of clinicians, alongside a rich body of humanities schoalrs and people from community arts and theatre, attending the event. Obviously, I could only get to some of the presentations, but I was taken by the unusual, documentary style presentation by Dylan Tighe - Antic Imposition: Acting Mad(ness) - blending critique around his own experience of bi-polar diagnosis and interventions with theatre and music.  It was noteworthy that his own recovery appeared to be closely tied to the development of his artistic life and performance.  Finally, Anna, Juliet and the team managed what few conferences achieve - a deeply warm hospitality and friendliness.  I do hope that this thread develops and retains this important spirit and mood.  Perhaps, it is time for a post-asylum conference - one that focuses on the less-foregrounded aspects of mental health care (centralised and informal) that moves away from institutional motifs.  As someone who worked at the end of the asylum era in the UK, through into community care, and now into the recovery movement, service-user involvement and self-care, I think such a shift would be timely. I am particularly interested in how theatrical performance (and other creative practices) could offer a route to mutual recovery between people with mental health challenges and their carers (formal and informal).  Anyone interest in that area can always contact me: paul.crawford@nottingham.ac.uk