This year, Mental Health Awareness Week runs from the 11th to the 17th of May, organised by the Mental Health Foundation. In support of this important campaign, the History Faculty Library’s book display features a collection of items on the history of mental health, in Britain and around the world, to showcase how our understanding of mental illness and wellbeing has developed differently across the globe.
Books featured on the display above, from left to right:
A history of male psychological disorders in Britain, 1945-1980 by Ali Haggett | Psyche on the skin : a history of self-harm by Sarah Chaney | Cultures of psychiatry and mental health care in postwar Britain and The Netherlands edited by Marijke Gijswijt-Hofstra and Roy Porter | The Routledge history of madness and mental health edited by Greg Eghigian | “Shattered nerves” : doctors, patients, and depression in Victorian England by Janet Oppenheim | Mad princes of renaissance Germany by H.C. Erik Midelfort | Madness, religion and the state in early modern Europe : a Bavarian beacon by David Lederer | Invention of hysteria : Charcot and the photographic iconography of the Salpêtrière by Georges Didi-Huberman ; translated by Alisa Hartz | Surfacing up : psychiatry and social order in colonial Zimbabwe, 1908-1968 by Lynette A. Jackson | Mass hysteria : medicine, culture, and mothers’ bodies by Rebecca Kukla | Remembrance of patients past : patient life at the Toronto Hospital for the Insane, 1870-1940 by Geoffrey Reaume | From swords to sorrow : homicide and suicide in early modern Stockholm by Arne Jansson
With Trinity Term upon us, now is a particularly relevant time to remind students of the array of mental health resources that they can access through the University and the Bodleian Libraries. You can find out more about available supportive resources here, and a list of wellbeing initiatives and activities currently running here. Additionally, the Oxford Student Union offers a wide range of advice and support, which can be found on their website.
We would also like to spotlight the wellbeing display in the Bodleian Old Library, which can be found outside the Upper Reading Room. This is a breakout space that offers a selection of poetry, self-help books and even a collection of zines, submitted by kind contributors both within and beyond the university. Do stop by when you need a peaceful moment away from your studies!
Accessing the following e-resource materials will require a Single-Sign-On Login for Oxford University members. External readers will need to log in with their Bodleian accounts while using the Bodleian libraries network (either with a device connected to the Bodleian Libraries Wi-Fi network or using the reader PCs within the library). Select a cover to be taken to that item’s SOLO page.
To add to our display, the following is a selection of more books on the history of mental health that are available to read online, in addition to a number of memoirs. Reading about others’ experiences begets greater understanding, and can help those struggling feel less isolated, hence these personal stories have been chosen to that end.
