Lisa Guenther, Philosopher of Prisons

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During June and July 2019, the Hidden Persuaders group invited political philosopher Lisa Guenther to lead a series of events on the topic of incarceration. A podcast of her keynote lecture ‘No Prisons on Stolen Land: Prison Abolition and Decolonization as Interconnected Struggles’ is now online.

Conference Programme: Decolonising Madness?

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This conference aims to contribute to the debate on the universality and cross-cultural applications of the notions of mental health and illness by exploring the historical origins and development of the notion of ‘global psyche’ and transcultural psychiatry.

The Archaeology of Mind Design – Frederic Migayrou

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Professor Frederic Migrayrou presents a history on the diverse techniques used by psychologists, artists and designers to subvert, excavate, reshape and reformat ‘the mind design.’ Using light, sound, drugs, hypnosis, architecture and psychotherapy, these practitioners concocted a plethora of far-out experiments aimed at altering consciousness. In this lecture Migayrou explores this colourful history and the many objects left behind in its wake.

The Manchurian Automaton

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Artificial Intelligence, Orientalism, totalitarianism, brainwashing, and the counter-culture: all these themes, and more, were deftly woven together by the historian of science, Simon Schaffer in a memorable lecture delivered at an engaging conference on cinema, Cold War and mind control which took place earlier this year. This event was organised by the Hidden Persuaders Project in partnership with the Birkbeck Institute for the Moving Image, and held on 3-4 July 2015.