Welcome to the personal
website of
Suman
Fernando
Writer, academic, former psychiatrist
Currently,
working with like-minded antiracism academics and other users of MH
services. Joined with Hari Sewell & a international tream to produce a new website launched 20 September 2023....
DECOLONISING PSYCHIATRY & CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY [WWW.DECOLPSYCH.COM]
I was a consultant psychiatrist in the British NHS for over 20 years unitl mid-1990s; have published extensively on transcultural psychiatry and institutional racism since
the mid 1980s; and have lectured widely in both the global South and
North. Unfortunately,the psychiatric / psychology establishments in the UK
avoid facing up to instituional racism in their professional practices
and structures by clinging to colonial racist views by making
tokenist appointments (e.g. Royal College of Psychiatrists has a Black-skinned president of African heritage!) I am now convinced that fundamental decolonisation of both psychiatry and psychology is
essential.
I chaired the National Standing Committee on Race & Culture of the Mental Health Commission for many years; and won a Lifetime Achievement Award sponsored by Kings Fund and MIND in March 2000. But when Tony Blair, the UK PM at the time,offered to put me up for an Order of the British Empire (OBE) I had to refuse, mainly because his government failed to
deal with institutional racism in mental health services. In 2011, I accepted the Lifetime Achievement Award for Race, Culture and Mental Health
given by the University of Toronto.
My
work now involves teaching, writing and lobbying for change. Although over 90 years age, I still read widely
on the
issues that interest me most recenlty ways of decolonising he 'psy' professions. Most recent books:
Institutional Racism in Psychiatry and Clinical Psychology (ground-breaking!) and Global Psychologies (the first of it's kind!)
If you want to read / own this or any other book
I have published
but find
it too expensive to buy, email me with a request -- I can help!
For list of appointments (click
to see).
.
See Videos Page for talks given and films of interest including MASTER CLASSES on a course on Mental
Health, Race and Culture at London Metropolitan University in 2011 (PPTs below)
Class 1: Tradition of Mental
Health and illness; what diversity means
Class 2:
Critical Psychiatry and Psychology: Transcultural Psychiatry, Cultural
Psychiatry, Anti-racist Psychiatry
Class 3: Mental Health around the Globe: Different
approaches to developing mental health in communities and individuals
Class 5: Class 5 Movement to reform psychiatry in UK:
How to make effective changes
Inquiry into 'Schizophrenia' (ISL) (CLICK) was an active website once the remnants of which remain - CLICK HERE to see Preliminary Findings
CLICK HERE for article on Global Mental Health.
All publications by Suman Fernando and videos belonging to Suman Fernando on this website are licensed under a Creative
Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs
3.0 Unported License. Please note that permision for videos are for screening only for non-commercial purposes not for streaming or downloading.
