"Anti-Psychiatry" Communications
Against a backdrop of American counterculture, print was a powerful vehicle for disseminating information and movement building around “anti-psychiatry” beliefs. Activists and organizations worked to elevate patient voices and critique establishment psychiatric practice in the public sphere. In the heyday of ex-patient, survivor, and consumer movement and radical therapy initiatives, newsletters, magazines, and other periodicals abounded. These records constituted a lively communications network and print culture. The Norman Dain PhD Papers and journal holdings at the Diethelm are rich in examples of such publications.
In the US, Madness Network News was written, edited, and published by a staff who themselves were former patients. Founded in 1972 as a newsletter, Madness Network News evolved into a journal and stayed in print until 1986. During its run, Madness Network News quickly became the primary publication of its kind focused on psychiatric oppression in North America.
Published in Toronto as a survivor’s movement journal, Phoenix Rising: The Voice of the Psychiatrized was in print from 1980 to 1990. It provided a publishing platform for former patients and reported on the mental patients liberation movement in North America and overseas.
In addition to print, radio was another outlet for the movement. Transcripts for radio shows on “The Madness Network” can be found in the Norman Dain PhD Papers. Covering a variety of topics in its programs, the station billed itself as “the voice of the mental patients’ liberation in New York.”
Psychiatrists pushing for alternate visions in the mental health landscape also utilized print media. Over the course of twelve issues published from 1970 to 1972, The Radical Therapist journal constituted a public forum where practitioners wrote about their anti-establishment principles. Although contributors wrote primarily for an audience of peers, they addressed issues such as the delivery of psychiatric services, patient oppression, as well as social and economic reasons for American mental distress.
