For many years, the MINDS foundation has focused its attention on reducing the stigma of mental illness in India. This year, however, the organization is broadening its focus with the help of Headspace, a new student publication that explores subjects related to mental health and beyond.
“The main purpose of the magazine is to create a dialogue regarding the brain, behavior, and mind, and to hear all the diverse perspectives that can shed a lot of insight into that,” said Faisal Kirdar ’14, who is one of the editors of the publication. “These issues are already on people’s minds and are being expressed in smaller circles, but we wanted to give it a larger venue.”
According to Kirdar, what makes Headspace unique is its emphasis on being interdisciplinary.
“Certain people have expertise in neuroscience, but someone who studies literature may know just as much about the mind,” Kirdar said.
The organizers have no doubt that this first issue will be diverse in terms of subject matter. So far, students have submitted works of fiction, poetry, memoir, and science writing, as well as photography and art.
Despite the history MINDS has with mental illness, Kirdar and two of the other founders, Alex Cantrell ’14 and Shyam Desai ’15, said that the staff really wanted to stay away from the words “mental illness” for the first issue.
“It’s not that there’s anything wrong with mental illness, but we wanted the magazine to be all things related to mental functioning, and I think that mental illness just narrows that a lot,” Kirdar said. “In the future, we might give more specific prompts, but at this point we went with the feeling that a lot of people wanted to write on this broad subject matter, and we wanted to encourage that enthusiasm.”
According to Kirdar, the editors have finished laying out all of the content and designing the pages, and the publication is ready to go. The students plan to publish the magazine in print and online by WesFest.
Currently, the staff of Headspace is made up of all students, and according to Cantrell, the team is well balanced. Some people keep the group on task, others are good with layout design, and still others have had experience working with other publications.
The students also came up with a standardized process for editing each submission. The editors decided to pair up for each piece, discuss whether they wanted revisions, and then contact the writers about making any proposed changes.
“It’s a good methodological process and a good exercise in team-building,” Cantrell said. “All of us bring a unique perspective.”
The editors have also been collaborating with faculty from the neuroscience and behavior department, which has wanted to create a student publication for a long time.
“The neuroscience department is totally funding the journal,” Kirdar said. “We have one professor who is writing the preface for the journal, and we’re seeking out advice from faculty members and seeing whether they have publications to submit. The department has wanted a space for students in the major to write more creative pieces or more thoughtful pieces than the standard lab report we do in chemistry.”
Cantrell emphasized that he hopes the publication of Headspace will draw more people to the MINDS foundation.
“Going forward into the future, we are going to want new members,” Cantrell said. “So if this is the kind of thing that appeals to people—crafting a journal about science writing—by all means reach out to us.”