Alastair Morgan
Lecturer (Mental Health), Faculty of Medicine & Health Sciences
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Biography
I studied for a first degree in Philosophy between 1987-1990 at the University of Sheffield.
After completing this degree I entered nurse education and qualified as a mental health nurse in 1994 - I worked in community adult mental health for a number of years, specialising in working in the voluntary sector and with marginalised and excluded groups. Jobs included a project worker in specialist accomodation for rough sleepers, groupworker in mental health day services, forensic mental health practitioner based at Highbury corner magistrates court, dual diagnosis practitioner working with homeless people in Assertive Outreach team, and finally, Team Leader for Assertive Outreach service.
During the period from 1994-2001 - I completed an M.A. in Modern European Philosophy at Middlesex University. Dissertation: Adorno's concept of reconciliation.
I began a part-time PhD in 2001 at Middlesex University and obtained the award of a doctorate in 2005 with a thesis entitled: " Life does Not Live: Concepts of Experience and Life in the philosophies of Theodor W. Adorno and Giorgio Agamben".
I joined the Division of Nursing at the University of Nottingham in March 2003
Expertise Summary
Philosophical expertise: Critical Theory ( particularly the first generation of the Frankfurt School, particularly Adorno and Benjamin), post-Kantian German philosophy, biopower and biopolitics ( particularly the philosophy of Giorgio Agamben), philosophy of psychiatry ( particularly the interface between continental philosophy and psychiatry), issues around coercion and consent in mental health care, philosophical issues in neuroscience, philosophy of mind.
Practice expertise: Engaging with marginalised groups, homelessness, dual diagnosis, principles and practice of Assertive outreach in mental health, classification and language in psychiatry, values-based practice, psychosis/schizophrenia ( particularly alternative institutional approaches i.e. Soteria and therapeutic communities), critical psychiatry.
Teaching Summary
Module Convenor for B72M17/M18 - second year module on Diploma/BSc in Nursing on principles and practice of recovery focussed mental health nursing.
Module convenor on M14150 - Philosophy of… read more
Research Summary
I am currently working on a book that analyses the interface between continental philosophy and psychiatry in the 20th century.
I am part of a team funded by Nottinghamshire Healthcare Trust Managed Innovation network looking at issues of decision making in in-patient mental health services.
I am working on a networking research effort to explore issues around the theme of "understanding psychosis".
Selected Publications
MORGAN ALASTAIR, ed., 2008. Being Human: Reflections on Mental Distress in Society 1st edition. Ross-On-Wye: PCCS Books.
MORGAN ALASTAIR, 2008. The authority of lived experience. In: MORGAN ALASTAIR, ed., Being Human - Reflections on Mental Distress in Society Ross-On-Wye: PCCS Books.
MORGAN ALASTAIR, 2007. Adorno's Concept of Life London, New York: Continuum Press.
Past Research
In 2007, I published a book based on my PhD research, entitled "Adorno's Concept of Life".
In 2008, I edited a book on the theme of the humanities and mental health, entitled "Being Human. Reflections on Mental Distress in Society.
From 2005-2008 - I was a lead member of the HUMAN Managed Innovation Network exploring issues of the relationship between the humanities and mental health through a series of seminars and a one-day conference on "Postpsychiatry" in 2007.
I have been a leading member of two successful research bids and projects, with two grants from the Higher Education Academy. From the subject centre for Philosophical and religious studies, we received a grant to interview and evaluate the teaching of philosophy to students who had not previously studied philosophy. This project was completed in 2008, and was conducted through a qualitative interview of students followed by an analysis of the data. The research produced a number of interesting results on the fears and anxieties of students studying philosophy, particularly in relation to learning a new philosophical language, but also found that students felt stimulated and challenged by their learning.
We followed this study up with another successful bid to the HEA for a grant to develop a reader for the philosophy of social science module that offers key texts with brief analysis, and a section on the relationship between the philosophical topic covered and specific research methodologies.
Future Research
My ongoing philosophical research is concerned with a consideration of what it might mean to think through the philosophical concepts of ipseity and reification as what Adorno terms "correlates". What does it mean for our fundamental pre-reflective selves to be reified at even the basic level of a pre-reflective responsiveness ?
This is the unifying conceptual theme for a series of ongoing interests that include:
- The construction of subjects as "neurochemical selves"
- What is a pathological gesture ?
- The possibility of understanding psychosis.
- The ideology of recovery in mental health.
- The debate on coercion in mental health care.
- Concepts of material transcendence and speculative materialism drawing on Adorno's philosophy.
- Conceptualisations of madness in Continental philosophy.
- Understanding of psychosis as anomalous self-experience.
- Philosophical conceptualisations of ipseity.
- The concept of reification in critical theory, particularly Axel Honneth's recent revision of the concept.