Method and madness: de/colonising scholarship and theatre research with participants labelled mad

ABSTRACT

This article discusses a long-term theatre project that I run with mental health care users and staff in a forensic psychiatric hospital in South Africa. I argue that the values underpinning the project align with those of Mad Studies, a field that is located as an emerging academic discipline within disability studies. The article seeks to problematise the conceptual frameworks available to a researcher working within theatre and disability in the global South. As a researcher, I may choose the framework of ‘madness’ as part of a social justice research stance. However, in a South African context of little to no psychiatric survivor/consumer activism, this may not in any way be adopted, understood, or claimed by any of the people who suffer ‘madness’ and with whom I create theatre. This article seeks to provoke questions around applied theatre disability research and the potential for research practices to de/re colonise.

KEYWORDS:

• Theatre and psychiatry
• mad studies
• disability arts South Africa
• decolonising research

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Alexandra Sutherland is an Associate Professor at Rhodes University South African where she heads the Applied Theatre courses for undergraduate and postgraduate study.

Notes

1. Some writers and activists reject the term mental illness, adopting a Foucaultian strategic reversal of power by using the term ‘madness’ instead (Menzies, LeFrancois, and Reume 2013). When the term ‘mental illness’ is used, it is due to the context of the discussion where a concept of madness fulfils a disease model.

2. In South Africa, mental illness is classified as a disability. This has a distinct social and economic implication as a person can apply for a disability grant, which is a means tested state grant that is the only source of income for millions of citizens, and often supports a whole family beyond the individual who receives it (Wright 2015). At the time of writing, a person on a disability grant received R1500 per month (approx. $100 per month), and 1.1 million people currently receive the disability grant.

3. Ethical clearance for this research has been granted by university, hospital and Department of Health ethical clearance and research boards. All participants discussed have given informed consent to be part of this research. Names used are pseudonyms.