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‘You wont know the shape of your unravelling until it happens’ says Rachel Lindsay’s disheveled comic avatar, sitting on her bed in a breeze-block room of the mental hospital to which she has just been committed. ‘But you probably have some idea what it looks like’ adds her previous corporate self, from the advertising office where she was in charge of marketing antidepressants. Rachel’s fall has been sudden and dramatic: from well-paid, corporate ‘suit’ to ranting unemployed maniac, shouting obscenities at authority and at her concerned parents. It is not often, nowadays, that I find myself unable to put down… Read More

Graphic Medicine Podcast – Panel 1C: Resistance – A Voice for the Voiceless

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Our third panel from Brighton, addressing issues of depression and comics, ethical issues facing medical students, and perceptions of Downs Syndrome. Use the Quicktime players below to view images along with the audio of each presentation. If you don’t have Quicktime, you can listen to an audio-only version of the entire panel. See link at the end of this post.  First up is Marie-Jeanne (MJ) Jacob, presenting her talk, Dark Days: The Ethical Implications Surrounding Depression, and Comics Creation as Retaliation She writes, Two years ago I began to brainstorm a comic discussing depression, as someone who both suffers from… Read More

The Voice of the Eye: Keynote address by David Small

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David Small’s keynote address “The Voice of The Eye” from the 2011 Comics & Medicine conference, Chicago. As a prelude to his talk, David played this video. David discusses his graphic memoir, three errors of the traditional physician he observes through his book, how to turn memories (or lack thereof) into a coherent story, some critical scenes of the book, and his influences in creating it.

Out of Service: Exploring PTSD Through Visual Storytelling

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Via Dr. Lara Hazelton at Dalhousie University:  This year, the winning entry in the Dalhousie Dept of Psychiatry Student Writing Competition (medical student category) was a graphic novella on PTSD by Stefania Spano… For those interested graphic novels in health humanities, it is worth checking out. Agreed, highly worth checking out. Spano’s innovative use of color, creative frame work, and compelling narrative help make this a fantastic graphic medicine project. She even linked to our site in her entry. Thanks, Stefania, for spreading the word! Thanks for sharing on the Literature & Medicine list serve, Lara!

New Podcast: Graphic Pathographies

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Use the Quicktime player above to view images along with the audio. If you don’t have Quicktime, you can listen to the audio-only version below. This wonderful panel, moderated by Michael Green, presents the creators of three unique and insightful graphic pathographies. Jenny Lin is a visual artist based in Montreal. She has created experimental narrative-based works in the formats of 2-D print, artist books, video and site-specific installation. She recently worked as a medical illustrator at McGill University and she currently teaches at Concordia University in the Print Media program. www.jenny-lin.ca. She writes of her presentation, In my presentation, Skinny… Read More

Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo & Me

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Reviewed by Michelle N. Huang, The Pennsylvania State University Ellen Forney poetically describes the manic episodes of her bipolar disorder as electrifying: “the sensation that my mind was spinning and overheating would sometimes build to a sensation like an electrical short—a burst of light, a melting or dissipating—.” Reading Forney’s graphic memoir, Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michelangelo, and Me, produces a similarly charged encounter. The reader experiences not only Ellen’s exhilarating highs—the extravagant book launch parties, the professional success—but also her devastatingly dark lows—the blank periods of time where she is unable to move herself from the couch. Marbles captures Forney’s… Read More

Bodyworld

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awaiting GM review Amazon.com Review Questions for Dash Shaw on Bodyworld Q: Bodyworld is about people who smoke a mysterious plant and can then read and feel each others’ thoughts. Where did you dream up that concept? Was there one event in particular that inspired it? A: When I was in college I was really into figure drawing, and kept being involved in it after I graduated. When you’re drawing someone, part of it is imagining what it’s like to be inside of the person. You imagine yourself in their body, or look for a psychology in the kinds of poses they make or… Read More

The Secret of the Brain Chip

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My registrar Paul Smith gave me this. He was given it during a psychiatry attachment, by a pharmaceuticals rep.  It was produced in 2003 by three belgian psychiatrists, one of whom, Erik Thys, did the illustration. It was produced with financial support from Janssen-Cilag, the pharmaceutical firm, and is dedicated to the founder: Dr Paul Janssen. I mention all this at the outset because I see it as very relevant. It does seem to me to be a book made with the best of intentions, using an easilly accessible medium (comics, although there is prose, poetry and medical text in… Read More