Cameron Duff

'Rushing behind the wheel' : investigating the prevalence of 'drug driving' among club and rave patrons in Melbourne, Australia

The paper reports the findings of survey research recently completed in Melbourne, Australia, among a sample of 455 club and rave festival patrons. This research aims to provide a clearer account of the prevalence of drug driving within such settings in Melbourne, as well as identifying relevant ‘predictors’ of this drug driving. Just under half of the sample (48%) indicated that they had driven a motor vehicle within four hours of consuming an illicit substance at least once in the past year; 22% of respondents reported driving while ‘knowingly intoxicated’ in the previous year. Fifteen percent reported such behaviour ‘several times’ or more in this time. Relatively permissive attitudes towards drug driving, coupled with higher than average prevalence of drug driving in ones peer group, were found to be significant predictors of drug driving. So too was the reported frequency of the use of cannabis and ecstasy, and the propensity to use these substances in ‘rave’ and ‘party’ settings. Given the levels of drug driving revealed in this study, the paper closes with a series of recommendations regarding the design and delivery of more effective anti-drug-driving strategies within rave and club settings.

Atmospheres of recovery: Assemblages of health

This article investigates recovery from mental health problems with reference to recent geographical analysis of affective atmospheres. In so doing, my research responds to recent calls to clarify the ways social, spatial and political factors may promote or impede recovery. As it is normally deployed, the notion of recovery emphasises the deeply personal character of rehabilitation from mental illness. It describes neither the full restoration of health (as a return to some ‘pre-morbid’ condition), nor the symptomologies characteristic of chronic illness, introducing the need for new ways of conceiving of a kind of health in illness. Throughout my analysis, I will treat recovery as an emergent capacity to manipulate the affects, spaces and events of a body’s “becoming well”. The always-unfinished event of recovery links human and nonhuman spaces, bodies, objects and forces in the joint expression of an enhanced capacity to affect (and be affected by) other bodies and spaces. I ground this discussion in analysis of ethnographic data collected in studies of recovery conducted in Melbourne, Australia. In presenting my findings, I will focus on three discrete atmospheres encountered in the course of this inquiry, and the ways these atmospheres modulated particular recovery events. In each instance, I will explore how atmospheres were encountered and co-constituted in the work of recovery, in the creation of an assemblage of health, and how these atmospheres gave social and material form to the process of becoming well. I will conclude by assessing how an attunement to affects, spaces and bodies may yield novel means of “staging” atmospheres of recovery in the promotion of an assemblage of health.

Three enactments of drugs in Danish prison drug treatment: Illegal drugs, medicine and constrainers

Abstract Drugs are an increasingly salient concern in many European prisons. Drug policies are made, drugs are controlled, used and prescribed and drug use is treated and sanctioned. In light of the growing significance of drugs in prison life, we analyse the different ways of drugs that are enacted in Danish drug treatment programmes, based on insights derived from Science and Technology Studies. We ground our analysis with data from two qualitative research projects conducted between 2007 and 2010 and between 2011 and 2014. In all, eight prisons were involved in the two studies. Our analysis reveals three distinctive drug enactments characterised by rather different practises, discourses and narratives: drugs as illegal substances, as medicine and as constrainers. Furthermore, we examine how policy makers, prison officers, health personnel, counsellors and prisoners contribute to the construction and organisation of these three enactments, along with the practical and discursive domains in which this work takes place. We conclude by assessing some of the implications of these different enactments of drugs for prisoners’ subjectivities.

Assemblages of creativity: Material practices in the creative economy

This article questions the anthropocentrism of existing treatments of creative work, creative industries and creative identities, and then considers various strategies for overcoming this bias in novel empirical analyses of creativity. Our aim is to begin to account for the nonhuman, ‘more-than-human’, bodies, actors and forces that participate in creative work. In pursuing this aim, we do not intend to eliminate the human subject from analysis of creative practice; rather we will provide a more ‘symmetrical’ account of creativity, alert to both the human and nonhuman constituents of creative practice. We draw from Deleuze and Guattari’s discussion of the assemblage to develop this account. Based on this discussion, we will define the creative assemblage as a more or less temporary mixture of heterogeneous material, affective and semiotic forces, within which particular capacities for creativity emerge, alongside the creative practices these capacities express. Within this assemblage, creativity and creative practice are less the innate attributes of individual bodies, and more a function of particular encounters and alliances between human and nonhuman bodies. We ground this discussion in qualitative research conducted in Melbourne, Australia, among creative professionals working in diverse fields. Based on this research, we propose a ‘diagram’ of one local assemblage of creativity and the human and nonhuman alliances it relies on. We close by briefly reflecting on the implications of our analysis for debates regarding the diversity of creative work and the character of creative labour.

Mental ill health, recovery and the family assemblage

The recovery approach is now among the most influential paradigms shaping mental health policy and practice across the English-speaking world. While recovery is normally presented as a deeply personal process, critics have challenged the individualism underpinning this view. A growing literature on “family recovery” explores the ways in which people, especially parents with mental ill health, can find it impossible to separate their own recovery experiences from the processes of family life. While sympathetic to this literature, we argue that it remains limited by its anthropocentricity, and therefore struggles to account for the varied human and nonhuman entities and forces involved in the creation and maintenance of family life. The current analysis is based on an ethnographic study conducted in Australia, which focused on families in which the father experiences mental ill health. We employ the emerging concept of the “family assemblage” to explore how the material, social, discursive and affective components of family life enabled and impeded these fathers’ recovery trajectories. Viewing families as heterogeneous assemblages allows for novel insights into some of the most basic aspects of recovery, challenging existing conceptions of the roles and significance of emotion, identity and agency in the family recovery process.

Tendencies and trajectories: The production of subjectivity in an event of drug consumption:

Posthumanist ontologies have been employed in theoretical and empirical research in human geography to explore the production of subjectivity in processes, events and relations. Similar approaches have been adopted in critical drug research to emphasise the production of subjectivity in events of drug consumption. Within each body of work questions remain regarding the durations and becomings of subjectivity. Responding to these questions, we introduce the notions of tendencies and trajectories as a way of theorising the emergent and enduring aspects of subjectivity. We ground this discussion in a select review of posthumanist geographies, geographies of habit and post-phenomenological approaches, along with vignettes drawn from an ethnographic study of young people’s recreational drug use conducted in Melbourne, Australia. We use these sources to indicate how the notions of tendencies and trajectories may help to account for the emergent and enduring aspects of processes of subjectivation in events of drug consumption.

Practising drinking, practising health

Meier, Warde & Holmes [1] seek to correct this oversight by offering the notion of practice as a methodological and epistemological alternative to more established approaches in alcohol studies. They are especially critical of approaches that emphasize the social determinants of variations in consumption within and between populations, and those that focus on the agency of individual drinkers, arguing that population interventions grounded in either orientation have ‘delivered only limited public health gains’ [1]. What is most welcome about Meier et al.s’ analysis is their insistence on the need for new quantitative approaches to studying alcohol consumption, rather than heeding the more common call for richer and more varied qualitative studies [2,3], which have had narrower impacts on the forms of knowledgemaking that underpin public health interventions. I do not regard this approach as dismissive of the value of qualitative research. Rather, I see it as recognition of the primacy of quantitative research in the design of public health interventions [4,5], with the corollary that more sensitive quantitative research models will probably have the greatest impact upon these interventions. Besides, few qualitative researchers with an interest in the contexts of alcohol consumption could quibble with Meier Meier et al.s’ focus on the role of practice, even if few have been so bold as to find in extant theories of practice a means of transforming the epidemiology of alcohol use. However, I would encourage the authors to follow the implications of practice theories for public health interventions a little further by emphasizing how the focus on practice troubles the very objects and purpose of these interventions. The designation of particular patterns (or practices) of alcohol consumption as problems within contemporary public health discourses rests on an apparent consensus with two key features; one that Meier et al., acknowledge, and another that they do not. With respect to the first aspect, public health discussions of problems arising from the consumption of alcohol share the assumption that individuals are independent ‘decision-makers’ with ‘substantial autonomy’ [1] over their drinking behaviours. This is the major reason why, as Meier et al. note, public health interventions tend to be ‘heavily influenced’ by theories of behaviour change [1]. It reflects a consensus that individuals are the most important agents of change in any effort to transform drinking behaviours. Theories of practice confound this consensus by calling attention to the role of exogenous factors in mediating drinking behaviours. However, the problematization of certain patterns of alcohol consumption in public health discourses also rests upon a putative consensus about the therapeutic value of moderation. It is assumed that the health and social costs of excessive alcohol consumption, however this excess may be understood, are recognized universally, even if some individuals stubbornly ignore these costs. Theories of practice challenge this consensus, particularly the assumption that individuals will naturally seek to reduce their exposure to risk once they have been made aware of it. These theories call our attention to the ways in which the relationship between alcohol consumption, risk, health and wellbeing is itself an outcome of practices, such that immoderate alcohol consumption may be understood just as readily as health promoting in certain contexts as abstinence or moderate consumption. This, I would wager, is the most significant implication of the authors’ discussion of the practice of ‘wine-o-clock’, which disrupts any simple consensus about the riskiness of alcohol use. Indeed, practice theories imply that ‘wine-o-clock’ may be understood just as readily in terms of health, recreation and wellbeing as risk or harm. Practice theories, in these ways, provide useful insights into why population efforts to reduce alcohol-related harms, including the promotion of safe-drinking guidelines, often fail [6,7], for practice theories expose the faulty assumptions that these interventions typically rest upon, particularly the assumed consensus regarding the therapeutic value of moderation. Safe drinking is a practice with discrete material, spatial, cultural and temporal elements [6]; it cannot be mandated by fiat. Designing novel interventions to reduce alcohol-related harms will require fresh insights into the ways these elements cohere in practice and how, equally, they may be transformed in practice.

Clinician perspectives on recovery and borderline personality disorder

Purpose Recovery is an important concept within mental healthcare policy. There is a growing expectation that clinicians adopt approaches that align with the recovery principles, despite significant disagreements about what recovery-oriented interventions might look like in practice. It is also unclear how recovery may be relevant to personality disorder. This paper aims to discuss these issues. Design/methodology/approach In total, 16 clinicians were interviewed at two mental health services in Melbourne, Australia. These clinicians had specialist training and experience in the treatment of borderline personality disorder (BPD) and provided insight regarding the meaning and relevance of the recovery paradigm in the context of BPD. Thematic analysis within a grounded theory approach was used to understand key themes identified from the interview data. Findings Thematic analysis suggested that clinicians understand recovery in three distinct ways: as moving towards a satisfying and meaningful life, as different ways of relating to oneself and as remission of symptoms and improved psychosocial functioning. Clinicians also identified ways in which recovery-related interventions in current use were problematic for individuals diagnosed with BPD. Different approaches that may better support recovery were discussed. This study suggests that practices supporting recovery in BPD may need to be tailored to individuals with BPD, with a focus on cultivating agency while acknowledging the creative nature of recovery. Originality/value Clinicians are in a strong position to observe recovery. Their insights suggest key refinements that will enhance the ways in which recovery in BPD is conceptualized and can be promoted.

Realism, materialism, and the assemblage: Thinking psychologically with Manuel DeLanda

The purpose of this article is to introduce Manuel DeLanda’s “assemblage theory” to psychology. Based on a select review of this theory, we argue that DeLanda’s work may allow for new ways of approaching unresolved problems in psychological inquiry, such as the realism–constructivism impasse, and disputes regarding linear and non-linear models of causality. DeLanda’s systematic treatment of the assemblage, using terms familiar to social scientists and analytic philosophers alike, offers a host of novel concepts and methods for the analysis of social, biological, and/or political systems, while also indicating how this analysis may be deployed in innovative social science inquiry. A number of psychologists have recently begun to explore the concept of assemblage. We add to these efforts in the present paper by assessing how DeLanda’s assemblage theory may open up a new “image of the psychological” to guide research and practice.

G Major to D Major to a Minor 7 (A Progression to Recovery)

This chapter relies on the heuristic example of learning to play the guitar to prise open the affective and embodied aspects of recovery from mental illness. Combining qualitative data derived from studies of young people’s recovery from mental illness conducted in Melbourne, Australia, with an autoethnographic account of my own guitar practise, I attempt to convey something of the actual experience of recovery. Drawing from recent work on affective pedagogies, I describe the ways young people living with mental illness learn how to recover, how to manage their illness, to adapt to difficult circumstances, and to live meaningful, satisfying lives. Focusing on the affected body of recovery, I explore what recovery feels like, what changes it involves for young people living with mental illness, and how youth come to recognise themselves as being in recovery. I close by assessing how an attunement to affect and the body may inspire novel means of facilitating the work of recovery.