Mental Health and Social Space: Towards Inclusionary Geographies?

In the nineteenth century, ′the mad′ were segregated in special asylum spaces; in the later twentieth century, these spaces were dismantled and patients discharged into the community. Now, in the twenty–first century, ‘community care’ is still in vogue, but what has happened to the people with mental health problems? Stories of neglect, ghettoization, homicide, and reinstitutionalization regularly litter the pages of newspapers and academic journals. Is this the whole story? Are those with severe and enduring mental health problems still living on the edges of society?
This book illuminates the complicated reality of people living with mental health problems. It focuses on their voices, relationships, and achievements through case studies tracing innovative examples of community activity that are creating versions of social tolerance, social recovery, and peer and self–help for this consistently marginalized group. People with mental health problems are active in rescripting their own social recoveries, using different community spaces to create pathways to psychological and social stability.

Spis treści:
List of figures.
Series editors′ preface.
Preface and acknowledgements.
1 Geographies of difference: understanding mental (ill) health and social space.
2 Placing mental health: community, inclusion and citizenship.
3 Cultural landscapes: rural communities and mental health.
4 Therapeutic natures? urban gardening, citizenship and social inclusion.
5 Artistic spaces: the arts and mental health.
6 Virtual communities: the Internet and on–line geographies of self–help.
Conclusion: innovative geographies of mental health.
References.
Index.

Nota biograficzna:
Hester Parr is Reader in Human Geography at the University of Dundee. She has worked on questions of mental health for over ten years, publishing in a range of journals, includin g Society and Space, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, Area, Health and Place and Social and Cultural Geography.

Okładka tylna:
In the nineteenth century, ′the mad′ were segregated in special asylum spaces; in the later twentieth century, these spaces were dismantled and patients discharged into the community. Now, in the twenty–first century, ‘community care’ is still in vogue, but what has happened to the people with mental health problems? Stories of neglect, ghettoization, homicide, and reinstitutionalization regularly litter the pages of newspapers and academic journals. Is this the whole story? Are those with severe and enduring mental health problems still living on the edges of society?
This book illuminates the complicated reality of people living with mental health problems. It focuses on their voices, relationships, and achievements through case studies tracing innovative examples of community activity that are creating versions of social tolerance, social recovery, and peer and self–help for this consistently marginalized group. People with mental health problems are active in rescripting their own social recoveries, using different community spaces to create pathways to psychological and social stability.