“It was Very Liberating”. Dialogic Literary Gatherings Supporting Mental Health Literacy

Abstract

Mental health is being reframed as a fundamental right for all people, and mental health literacy is a tool that can enable patients to gain the knowledge, personal skills, and confidence to take action to improve their mental health, and their lives overall. This exploratory study analysed the power of dialogic literary gatherings (DLGs) to foster it in a group of patients with mental health disorders who gathered for 1 h once a week to share their readings of literature masterpieces. During the year-long study, a total of 140 patients participated in the DLGs in groups of 12 to 15 people. Results suggest that DLGs promoted the development of the participants’ mental health literacy and produced gains in emotional and social wellbeing by strengthening reading, speaking, and listening skills, fostering supportive relations, contributing to overcoming stigma, and enhancing agency. The transferability of DLGs to mental health care is discussed.