David Cooper: Anti-Psychiatry and Non-Psychiatry. Inner Circle Seminar 104 (23 July 2006)

David Cooper, 1967

David Cooper

Anti-Psychiatry and Non-Psychiatry

Anthony Stadlen

conducts

Inner Circle Seminar No. 104

Sunday 23 July 2006

10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

David Cooper died 20 years ago, on 29 July 1986. His legendary ‘anti-hospital’ for young ‘schizophrenics’, Villa 21, had died 20 years earlier, in 1966. Shenley Hospital renamed it Villa 20A, and there would never again be a Villa 21 until the hospital itself closed at the end of the twentieth century. Theodore Dalrymple recently called Cooper’s books ‘worthless’. Laing and Esterson disliked them. Szasz wrote (1978): ‘Cooper is often wrong-headed, but he is honest. Laing is level-headed, but is he ever honest?’ Today, we examine Cooper’s writings. Anthony Stadlen also reflects on his own work with Cooper in Villa 21 (1965–6); on the Dialectics of Liberation Congress (1967) and the ‘Anti-University’ (1967–8), both of which Cooper master-minded (or anti-master-anti-minded); and on Cooper’s later activities. We attempt a balanced evaluation. Your participation in the discussion is welcome.

Venue: Room F, Acland, Regent’s College, Inner Circle, London NW1
Cost: Students £72, others £90, some bursaries, in advance
Apply to: Anthony Stadlen, ‘Oakleigh’, 2A Alexandra Avenue, London N22 7XE
Tel: +44 (0) 20 8888 6857 E-mail: stadlen@aol.com