Linda J Peake

Addressing issues of mental health became virtually unavoidable in the AngloAmerican academy during the last decade, particularly in relation to students. Conversations about mental health have begun to proliferate among graduate students and other scholars contingently employed in the academy. The increasing visibility of graduate students experiencing mental and emotional distress is indicative of how the ground upon which “normal” is defined has been shifting rapidly beneath our feet. The relationship between the social and the physiological across different states of mental health is one that continues to be contested among scholars. Studies that examine how the corporatisation of higher education affects mental health are only just starting to appear in geography. One study of geography graduates in the US reveals their co‐optation into a neoliberal ethos of individuality, competition and heightened pressures of productivity and performance, resulting in feelings of inadequacy, guilt, and isolation, and indicative of a survival‐oriented campus culture.

An increasing number of students seeking mental health services across university campuses have prompted faculty, administrators and student service providers to call attention to what some describe as a crisis. In exploring what a critical commitment to addressing emotional and mental distress in the academic context of the global north might look like we discuss different understandings of what is meant by mental health and the manifestation of distress in the academy as the 'new normal'. After examining data from Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom for different constituent groups within university communities we turn to understand this crisis beyond instances of individual distress by situating it within the context of the conditions of knowledge production in neoliberalizing universities. We conclude by imagining a different kind of academy, exploring how the practices that produce it can be differently enacted, outlining the opportunities for and obstacles to a collective and professional response. University campuses are enriched when they recognize and make space for the diversity of mental states that constitute the human condition, but devalued when they create stressful work environments that exacerbate or initiate mental distress. Critical Reflections on Mental and Emotional Distress in the Academy 254

Key Messages There is a crisis of mental health in the academy. This special issue, the first to address this crisis, brings together three bodies of research: geographers' understanding of the relationship between mental health, social space, and material places; mental health initiatives in higher education; and the neoliberalization of the academy. In this introduction we discuss two particular foci: defining the crisis of mental health and wellbeing in neoliberalizing universities, and institutional and individual responses. Drawing upon recent initiatives to highlight issues of mental health in the academy we focus in this special issue on work by geographers from Canada, the United States, England, and New Zealand that aims to shed some light on the ways that the organized practices of the academy are implicated in the current state of mental health of a broad cross section of its members across university campuses. In bringing the perspectives of Geography graduate students and faculty to bear on questions of mental wellness, this special issue is unique in its attempt to bring together three bodies of research: geographers' understanding of the relationship between mental and emotional health, social space, and material places; mental health initiatives in institutions of higher education; and the neoliberalization of the academy. Drawing together review articles, interview-based research, collective writing, and personal narratives, the articles and viewpoints bring together understandings of the crisis of mental health and wellbeing in neoliberalizing universities, and institutional and individual responses. R eflexions critiques sur la formation d'une ethique du bien-^ etre en g eographie Prenant appui sur les d emarches entreprises r ecemment pour mettre en evidence les probl emes de sant e mentale dans le milieu universitaire, ce num ero sp ecial se consacre aux travaux effectu es par des g eographes en provenance du Canada, des Etats-Unis, de l'Angleterre et de la Nouvelle-Z elande afin de jeter un eclairage sur le rapport entre les modes d'organisation du milieu universitaire et l' etat actuel de sant e mentale d'un vaste echantillon du personnel en poste dans plusieurs campus universitaires. En d egageant les perspectives des etudiants des cycles sup erieurs et des professeurs en g eographie qui se penchent sur le bien-^ etre mental, ce num ero sp ecial innove en proposant une synth ese de trois champs de la connaissance scientifique : la compr ehension par les g eographes de la relation qui unit la sant e mentale et emotionnelle, l'espace social et les A video presentation is available at