WEEK 7 READINGS

Wipond, R. (2013). Pitching Mad: News media and the

psychiatric survivor perspective. In B LeFrancois, R Menzies,
and G Reaume (Eds.), Mad Matters: A Critical Reader in
Canadian Mad Studies. Toronto: Canadian Scholars Press.

Wipond outlines a number of knots of belief that need

to be untangled in order for a psychiatric survivor perspective
to make it into the news. What
are those knots, and how are they intertwined?
All parts are so connected that if you pull just one place
everything falls if you pull on one string it makes more of a
mess
The belief of most news producers about psychiatric issues
are similar
The Beliefs of Civil Rights impression that civil rights are
like emergency rights mental health without consent
The Beliefs about the science of Mental Illness
Psychiatrist telling journalistic that thousands of studies has
established basis for mental illness
The Beliefs About Corporate Influence advertising
pharmacuticals and public relation initiatives
The Beliefs about Independent Organizations no
mentioning of civil rights of mentally ill in the American civil
liberties union mental health organization support
mainstream psychiatry activities but dont mention rights for
mentally ill
The Beliefs about the Social Welfare System social
service groups pinking up on the mental health safty net
they run many social service agencies. Many emergency
shelters, family and child fall back into involuntary
incarceration policing rather then social welfare.
The Beliefs about the Crazy Person people labeled with
mental illnesses are not good sources for news producers
only tow groups: consumers/survivors mad people will not
be trusted/ used as a basis for a news story madness
distorted through news source
The Belief about Going Mad- quick fixes/ biochemical
model of mental illness people fear becoming mad/selfloathing/depressive these feelings produce resistance

Wipond makes tools for change recommendations on

how to get psychiatric survivor perspectives into the media.
What are they?
Showing news producers what the story is and how to
portray it
Educating those people who work with people statistically
more likely to be subjugating to coercive powers of the
mental health system
News producers regarded as credible to offer alternatives to
dominant psychiatric system
o Non medical/ Alternative mental health workers/
Professional association to them
o Lawyers who understand rights issues
o Academic researchers who critique the psychiatric
system

Hornstein, G.A. Excerpts from Agnes' Jacket: A

Psychologist's Search of the Meanings of Madness, pp. 235267.
Hornstein explains that it is common for people to desire
biographical information about the patients who created the
artwork in the Prinzhorn collection. This is not typically the
case when exhibiting artwork. Why is there a demand for this
information? And what does this say about how we understand
art made by mad people?

Fritz Mohr is an example of approaching mad art in a way to

understand madness. He sought to relate disturbances in the
ability to draw simple shapes to specific types of neurological
malfunction, and to the main psychiatric syndromes not
understood as art
More saw it as insane art and Prizhorn just saw it another
type of art
It places mad people in a way where their art is a tool for
diagnosing themselves, when really it can just be a tool for
self expression
Works of art are usually seen on their own terms, despite who
created them Prinzhorn works so that mad people have the
same
Example: Solders in WWI with trench art (untrained people)
outside art

In what ways can Agnes Jacket be seen as an artistic act

of resistance within the asylum?
Linin from old hospital uniforms different colours of yarn
and thread seen as a piece of textile art
By using found objects and creating her own art, not supplied
by psychiatrists its a way for her to express herself within the
system taken apart her hospital uniform for the jacket
Case record shows no mention of the jacket
Rozsika Parker the art of embroidery provides a weapon of
resistance to the constraints of femininity
Contrasting the grey asylum uniforms or straitjackets forced
shows resistance defiance against stereotypic image of
mad women in tattered clothes
Stiches words like Brother Freedom suggesting poem and
resistance