Free Thinking: What is normal?

23 January 2024

IMH researchers Louise Creechan and Robert Chapman discuss neurodiversity, disability and madness in an episode of BBC Radio 3’s Free Thinking.

Earlier this week Louise Creechan and Robert Chapman joined Sarah Chaney and Matthew Sweet on an episode of BBC Radio 3’s Free Thinking to explore the history of ideas about ‘normality’. Robert is Assistant Professor of Critical Neurodiversity Studies and the author of Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism. Louise is a Lecturer in Literary Medical Humanities and a BBC New Generation Thinker. She is working on a book about literacy in the nineteenth century.

Both Robert and Louise are part of our Measurement Lab in the Discovery Research Platform for Medical Humanities, where they are exploring measures of normality, diversity and function in mental health, with a specific focus on neurodiversity.

You can catch the full episode of Free Thinking: What is normal? on BBC Radio Sounds.