The language of madness | Shayda Kafai | TEDxCPP

Why do we say words that don’t mean what they mean? People have changed the definition of words within pop culture. The language created is then one in which people can get hurt or afraid open up to others.

Dr. Shayda Kafai is a lecturer at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona’s Ethnic and Women Studies Department. She earned her Ph.D. in Cultural Studies from Claremont Graduate University. Her dissertation titled Re-inscribing Disability: The Performance Activism of Sins Invalid explores the performance art and disability justice work of Sins Invalid, a San Francisco Bay Area based performance project. As a queer, disabled woman of color, she is committed to exploring the numerous ways we can reclaim our bodies from intersecting systems of oppression. Shayda lives in Los Angeles with her wife, Amy.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

I want to first say
that I want to dedicate this talk

to all the folks who lean into the unknown
and share their stories anyway.

I want to dedicate this talk
to my wife, Amy.

(Applause)

I want to begin by sharing
with you all a part of myself.

It's something that I don't talk
frequently about.

When I was 17, I was diagnosed
with manic depression.

I want to stop there

because by uttering those
two small words, "manic depression",

I've just created very strong
negative ripple effect in this auditorium.

Perhaps you're now viewing
my body differently than you did

when you heard my intro.

Perhaps you're ascribing stereotypes
onto my body that aren't mine.

I think it's important that you all know
that at this point I want to say,

"Thank you all for listening",
and I want to go off stage,

but I'm going to stay.

(Applause)

So much clapping.

(Laughter)

We're all familiar
with the phrases "depression",

we're familiar with the term "mania".

Perhaps you've used
these words colloquially.

"I feel so depressed today."
"He's acting so manic."

For me, mania and depression

were felt in more invasive,
regular everyday ways.

They literally invaded into my everyday.

And although this is just my experience,

I think that it's important to know too

that everyone's experience
is radically different.

I was 17, I graduated high school,

I was beginning my journey
into a local JC,

and for me, depression felt
like an overwhelming weightiness.

I felt like I was in a room
without a door knob.

Getting out of the bed
and beginning the day

was a success in and of itself.

I was so suicidal that I couldn't drive,

so my mother would drive me to my college,

wait for three hours in the parking lot,
pick me up, drive me back home.

Although it wasn't as frequent
or as long-standing,

for me, mania was an overwhelming sense
of focus and energy,

and I truly felt, invincible.

By the time I finished my PhD work,

I was hospitalized four times.

Now, this is not how
I was going to start my TED talk.

Not even close.

I was going to talk to you all

about the statistics surrounding madness.

I was going to talk to you
about semantics.

I was going to tell you about the history,

of how we conceive of
and inscribe madness,

and it wasn't until the fourth draft
of my talk that I realized

I had completely written myself
out of this conversation,

and I had to pause and ask myself why.

Why in a talk where I was going to explore
the negative ripple effects

created by the ways
in which we conceive of madness,

had I written out my narrative?

A narrative that so completely fit
into the conversation.

And the answer is simple,

and I think absolutely problematic
in its simplicity.

And it's one word.

It's shame and it's stigma.

Even as I stand here before all of you,

I am feeling very apprehensive
about how I am being read,

how my body is being read,

by my former, my current,
my future students.

How is my body and my identity
being read by my colleagues.

Am I being read as inferior,
as incompetent, as untrustworthy?

Some of you might even be sitting
and thinking quietly to yourselves,

"But she doesn't look crazy."

And to that question, I ask you,
but what does craziness look like?

And in fact, we have been taught
what craziness looks like, right?

Many institutions
in our society have taught us

and have helped us cultivate a very strict
and rigid understanding of madness.

And just to illustrate the speed
at which this happens,

and has happened for all of us
since we were very young,

I want you all to pause with me and think.

What do you think of,
what images, what connotations,

what do you think of when you hear
the word "insane"?

What do you think of when you hear
the word "crazy"?

What connotations and images come to mind
when you hear the phrase "mental illness"?

Perhaps your thoughts and your images

are informed by the way
the news media ascribes disabilities,

psychiatric disabilities, and madness.

Perhaps your thoughts
are informed by literature,

by graphic novels, by the movies.

I go to the movies.

Perhaps you thought of "Girl Interrupted",

"One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest",

"Psycho",

"Mommy Dearest",

or "A Beautiful Mind".

Irregardless of where
you've given these images

or where you've gotten these images from,

I think that a very rigid list
of stereotypes gets created.

And although we probably did it together
and keep adding to this list,

a very brief list is as follows.

Folks with psychiatric disabilities
are often viewed as being dangerous,

unpredictable, incompetent,

unstable, irrational, and irresponsible.

Now, the images or connotations

that you so quickly call to mind

when I ask you all to pause
and just meditate on the words

"insane", "crazy", and "mental illness",

the images that I've pulled up
that my mind went to,

and this list of stereotypes,

this is why it took me four drafts
to write myself in this talk.

The sheer universality of these terms
and these images, and the weightiness

regulate folks
with psychiatric disabilities,

regulate me.

I think it's really important to know
that, unlike other illnesses of the mind,

psychiatric disabilities carry with them
something that's very distinct and unique.

They carry a moral judgement
on the individual.

So, what do we do with all of this?

Before telling you that,
I want to tell you

what the purpose of this talk is not.

I think often, when folks
with disabilities of any kind

share their narratives or speak,

they are often seen as an inspiration.

Their story is meant to be heard
and is meant to inspire you

to bettering your life
as non-disabled folks,

or even as other disabled folks.

I am here to tell you
that I am not your inspiration.

That's not my purpose.

The purpose of this talk is to ask

that we collectively cultivate
a community and space

for unlearning the stereotypes and stigmas

that we ascribe
to psychiatric disabilities.

I want us to live in a place

where someone sharing
that they have manic depression

is as benign as someone saying
to another person, "I have diabetes."

I want us to live in a place
where the moral judgements

that often get placed onto folks
with psychiatric disabilities is removed.

I want us to live in a place
where I can come before a group of people,

or just a person,

this way,

and stand and say,
"My name is Shayda Kafai.

I'm a professor in the Ethnic
and Women Studies Department

at Cal Poly Pomona.
I have manic depression."

Thank you.

(Applause)