What does it mean to live and participate in the community with severe mental illness? Researchers from Birzeit University (Suzan Mitwalli, Dr. Yoke Rabaia) and King's College London (Prof. Hanna Kienzler) have explored this question in the context of Palestine with persons with severe mental illness and practitioners from the Palestinian Counseling Center. Their findings have led to the publication of an illustrated storybook, “Get to know us! Our lives with mental illness in the Palestinian community,” which explores the difficulties and limited opportunities for people with mental illness to live and participate in their communities with chapters focusing on the notions of community, life with mental illness, equity, spare time, and the rights to medication and work.

In this talk, Hanna Kienzler will share insights into community inclusion and participation of people with severe mental illness in Palestine; explain how the process of co-producing the book came about; discuss challenges and facilitators for co-production in complex contexts, and highlight how you can use the book as part of your teaching, training and awareness raising initiatives. At the end, there will be time for questions and conversation.

Feel free to engage with the book beforehand (not required!). A PDF copy of the book (Arabic and English) as well as audio recordings (Arabic) of all the chapters are freely available to you on this website: https://www.get-to-know-us.com

 

How to join this event

This is an online event that is free and open for all to attend.

Please register for this event on Zoom.

 

Speaker Biography

Hanna Kienzler is Professor of Global Health in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine and Co-Director of the ESRC Centre for Society and Mental Health at King’s College London. She investigates how systemic violence, ethnic conflict, and complex emergencies intersect with health and mental health outcomes in the occupied Palestinian territory, Kosovo, and, among refugees, in the UK. She conducts research on the mental health impacts of war and trauma on survivors; on what it means for persons with severe mental illness to live and participate in their respective communities; and on humanitarian and mental health interventions in fragile states. She is also co-founder of the Refugee Mental Health & Place network. Methodologically, her work combines ethnography with a range of other qualitative methods, participatory action approaches and arts-based techniques.