Circa 1989 Women's Studies Group Project on Women and Madness Spiral_bound - 1989

Mankato, Minnesota: Minnesota State University, Mankato, 1989. Spiral_bound. Good. Spiral_bound. This circa 1989 group project on women and madness is the work of six students in a Women's Studies course taught by the influential Jewish lesbian feminist Dr. Bette Tallen at Minnesota State University. Subjects include: the connection between witches and mad women, the epistemological issues in science concerning women and madness, a survey of hysteria through the theories and criticisms of Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Helene Cixous, and Juliet Mitchell, lesbianism and compulsory heterosexuality and madness, Maori women and colonisation and madness, psychology and the family as patriarchal institutions, and feminist utopias as "a space to be mad(e)," along with in-depth reviews of the participatory research and group process through which the project was conducted. Each section includes an illustration, presumably by the student authors, the collection of which can be seen on the front cover, and the text is additionally illustrated with a vignette by Linda Marie Nole as well as a fold-out plate of a digram entitled "What is Heterosexuality & What causes it?" The text begins and concludes with poems by Mary Moran and Chiah Heller-Zbloki from the multicultural lesbian literary and art journal Sinister Wisdom's 36th issue: Surviving Psychiatric Assault & Creating Emotional Well-Being in Our Communities. This rigorously researched and creatively presented Women's Studies group project offers a unique look at the material, critical theories, and intersectional perspectives students engaged with in the late 1980s or early 1990s at an institution like Minnesota State University. Signed by 6 students. 11 3/4" X 8 3/4". [iii], 90pp, [i], printed rectos only, with fold-out plate. Combbound wraps with protective plastic covers. Moderate wear to binding, with rubbing and creasing to extremities, dust soiling to combs, and yellowing to top edge of wraps. Binding is firm and sound. Pages are clean and unmarked.