‘Hard Times’ in The Archers at Christmas
It is often said that if Charles Dickens were writing now it would be for a popular soap opera perhaps as a script-writer for BBC radio 4 serial The Archers. John Yorke described soaps as ‘modern morality plays’; the latest...
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Selling Stigma: Mental Illness and the Media
In the same week that we celebrate World Mental Health Day, the Sun newspaper ran a front page headline which read “1,200 killed by mental patients”. The statistics were written in lurid ‘blood red’ with much smaller writing below which stated...
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Inequality as a test of strength…?
Notions of recovery and resilience are ubiquitous at the moment. Resilience particularly seems to have made the jump from a concept in positive psychology material into a mainstream policy objective ranging across inequality, poverty, and community wellbeing (to name but...
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Suicide and austerity: exploring the link
In the last 12 months a number of studies have re-examined the relationship between suicide and unemployment across Europe and the United States. Suicide rates have accelerated in these countries following rapid rises in unemployment due to the economic crisis. Yet,...
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On trying to do therapy when your patient has no food or money