14.036 - Decolonizing Dis/ability Categories of Mental Health at Their Intersections: A Collaborative Interdisciplinary Approach

Session Type: Symposium

Abstract

The purpose of this session is to interrogate the normalization of dis/ability categories of mental health at the intersections of identity markers such as race, ethnicity, and gender from a decolonizing global mental health perspective (Mills, 2013) by bringing together five friends and colleagues across three papers that focus on national and international case studies and a critical literature review. Across and within each of the papers there are theoretical, methodological and practice implications.

Sub Unit

• SIG-Disability Studies in Education

Chair

• Chantal Figueroa, University of California - Los Angeles

Papers

• Counternarratives Versus Traditional Mental Health Narratives: African American Women's Lived Experiences With a Dis/ability - Mercedes Adell Cannon, Indiana University - Indianapolis

• Problematizing Mental Disorders From a Gender Perspective in Guatemala - Chantal Figueroa, University of California - Los Angeles

• The Case Studies of Ben, Luna, and Daniel: Toward a Decolonizing Global Mental Health Perspective - Carlyn Mueller, Vanderbilt University; Laurie Gutmann Kahn, Moravian College; David Isaac Hernandez-Saca, University of Northern Iowa

Discussant

• Nirmala Erevelles, The University of Alabama