It Doesn’t Have To Be Like This

Commentaries on mental health and the

Cambridge experience.

Produced for Cambridge Defend Education’s #endweek5blues campaign

TContents

What this zine is all about! ! ! ! ! ...2

Experiencing Both Sides! ! ! ! ! ...4

Mental health and the Natural Sciences Tripos ! ! ...7

This isn’t a f*cking workhouse! ! ! ! ...12

“Useless”! ! ! ! ! ! ! ...16

Exam Failure and Social Anxiety! ! ! ! ...17 “Breather” ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ...21

Info about supporting #endweek5blues ! ! ...23

Example email to send to supervisors! ! ! ...24

Alternatives to [degree] work! ! ! ! ...25

Tuesday 17th February

Wednesday 18th February

• Art Chill-Out Day. Drop in to the CUSU conference room for a chance to de-stress with like-minded people and art supplies.

9:00am -> 6:00pm in the CUSU offices, New Museums site. There’s a wheelchair lift into the building and people around to help you with it.

• #endweek5blues rally. To finish off a week of campaigning, Cambridge Defend Education goes to the senate house..

2:00pm in front of Senate House. Wear warm clothes!

All WeekCambridge Speaks Its Mind will be running a photo campaign to give students and alumni of Cambridge University a chance to share their experiences of Cambridge welfare, and tell the world what they would do to improve it. Download and print a photocard, write down your experience or a way to improve welfare, and upload your picture to their facebook page.

Monday 16th February

• “Radical Self-Love: A Workshop” About loving your fat, gay, black, hairy, trans, enby, poor, disabled, bi, brown, sick, mad, beautiful self. Even though you're not supposed to.

2:00pm Harrods Room, Queens Building, Emmanuel College. This place is upstairs but has lift access.(Another workshop will be held on Thursday 19th. See the Facebook event for more!)

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Cambridge has a mental health problem. In recent years the stigma surrounding discussions on mental health in Cambridge has declined, in part due to the excellent work of groups like ‘Cambridge Speaks Its Mind’ and ‘This Space’.  But now that mentally ill people have made great gains in decreasing social stigma, it’s time to ask and answer the questions: why are so many of us at Cambridge mentally ill? And what can we do to make Cambridge better for mentally ill students?

People may be tempted to answer the first question by saying that students at Cambridge are intelligent or are perfectionists and as such are more likely to develop mental illness. Such an answer ignores the fact that psychologists are yet to establish that there is a causal link between high intelligence and mental illness. This answer also treats it as mere coincidence that other Russell group universities, which do clearly contain intelligent people, do not appear to have as pressing a mental health crisis as Cambridge.

To help answer the first question, this zine looks at how Cambridge is structured and how this has an impact of people’s well-being. Cambridge students are over-worked and over-stressed in an environment of eight week terms, weekly supervisions, constant practicals and lectures, little coursework and lots of end of year exams. This environment of stress exacerbates already existing mental health problems an individual may have or enables - and indeed causes - new mental health problems to

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Alternatives to [degree] work

Thursday 12th February

Friday 13th February

Saturday 14th February

• “From Campaigning To Exam Allowances - Equality Law For The Average Student” A workshop [to] run through the law on equality and how this can be a useful tool for you in navigating the complex Cambridge system.

7:30pm St John’s CollegeA second workshop will be running at 3:30pm on Sunday 15th February in the Harrods Room, Emmanuel college. This place has lift access.

• “Misogyny and Ableism” discussion. An open discussion on the effect misogyny has on how people enact and experience ableism, particularly as it applies to people with mental illnesses. Feel free to bring articles, poems and so on to help facilitate discussion!

6:30pm Keynes Seminar room 2, Kings college. There’s a level access way around the back.

• Anti-Valentine’s Day party organised by CUSU Women’s Campaign. 5:00pm - talk

6:30pm -> 8:00pm - tea, coffee and delicious snacks, (alcohol free) + queer craft 8:30 pm -> late ~anti-valentines day party~Starts 5pm in the Graduate Union café: lift & ramp are round the side of the building

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develop. After all, many people here barely manage to do the work, see friends and also sleep, let alone maintain mental stability through regular self-care.

These mentally ill students then receive inadequate support from tutors with no training in counselling or mental health; an over-subscribed and under-funded counselling service; and a system of intermitting in which it is falsely assumed that all students can best recover at home.Cambridge clearly needs to change, but first it must listen to mentally ill students and acknowledge that our welfare is not being protected by the University. If anything, it is being attacked by a university structure that prioritizes the prestige of a large workload and an intense exam term over our basic needs.

How then should Cambridge change? Our modest first (and by no means last) proposal is the introduction of a reading week.  

Serving Sizes

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An example of an email you can send to your supervisors to explain why you won’t be

handing in work this week.

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Scanned by CamScanner

Sarra

Cambridge had always been a dream for me. I had visited with my dad a couple of years before finishing school and fell in love completely with the city. I worked so hard in my final year of school that I hardly saw my friends at all. I remember crying when I got the offer, crying on results day when I missed that offer by a tiny percentage and crying again when I received the email from the admissions tutor offering me my place at Homerton. Despite holding such high expectations, first year didn't disappoint. I threw myself into university life. I met some amazing friends in Freshers week and besides the few teary, homesick nights and the (less) few essay crises, my first two years at Cambridge went by in a haze of excitement and new, wonderful people. The overriding feelings were that I was happy, confident and that I could cope. For this reason I understand the temptation to dismiss or even to not believe someone who doesn't like Cambridge. I used to get frustrated when people complained. Look around, could they not appreciate the beauty of this place? Why were they nit picking? Didn't they know that not everything has to be perfect? Couldn't they just appreciate the good bits and deal with the bad? I didn't realise that not everyone can deal with the bad until I couldn't deal with it myself. Looking back, I am ashamed at my lack of basic empathy. I've always struggled to a greater or lesser extent with anxiety. Just before returning for my final year, my anxiety was at an all time high and I had to delay returning. I started back in college thinking that perhaps the busy atmosphere would distract me. It did anything but. I either wasn't going to lectures or I was leaving them early to have a panic attack

Experiencing Both Sides: Why a Reading Week Would Make a Difference

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The strike is in support of a “reading week” – a week with no work in the middle of a proposed 9-week term. The campaign is mainly focused on people who cannot cope with working flat-out for 8 weeks or whose health is affected by doing so, although all students are encouraged to take part.

During week 5 students will be showing their support for a reading week in several different ways. Some students will be symbolically refusing to hand in work, while still completing any work they’d like to. Others will be wearing blue squares in solidarity with the campaign. Some students will continue as normal while making their support for a reading week known to their peers and teachers.

You’re not in any way obliged to take part in all aspects of the action - it’s up to you to choose which level of activity you feel able and safe doing, but please do publicise the campaign - tell everyone about it and support them in taking part if they’d like to.

You are legally entitled to engage in protest and CUSU Council has voted that CUSU should act to protect students engaging in strike action. As a student union, your JCR or MCR, along with CUSU, have a legal duty to protect students from victimisation for taking part in political protest. If you are facing difficulties or just want more information, you can ask these people.

If your college is attempting to impose sanctions on you – whether with direct disciplinary action or indirectly via things like saying “if you don’t hand in work you have to miss the supervision, and we have a policy of fining for missed supervisions” – CUSU or your JCR or MCR should support you, and stop any victimisation towards you.

INFORMATION FOR STUDENTS WHO WANT TO SUPPORT #ENDWEEK5BLUES

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in the bathroom. I couldn't sit still long enough to read one article, never mind write an essay. My default setting was anxiety and a lack of hope, not happy and able as it had been before. Cambridge turned into a place I didn't recognise. There was absolutely no way I was able to appreciate the beauty of my surroundings as I was too busy trying to figure out where was the best place to have my next panic attack. I spent most of my time on Skype, crying. It was only when the anxiety began to ease towards the end of the term that I felt in any way capable of reaching out to the college for help and at that point I was a good bit behind with work. The anxiety had killed my self-confidence and I hated myself for not keeping up. The intensity of the workload, the hectic nature of the term and the isolation of the kind of work I was doing all increased my anxiety. Something that not only adds to it, but also often triggers it is the abrupt change of pace between term and the holidays. I have seen Cambridge from the perspective of someone who is happy and able to cope and also as someone who is deeply unhappy here. I know now that I am ultimately able for Cambridge. I am intelligent and capable enough to be here. But when you are in the midst of mental illness it can feel like you are the problem, not your mental illness. If we want our university to be somewhere where students can reach their full potential and really enjoy their education, we need to find ways of effectively helping those students who are dealing with mental illness. It should not be a case of sink or swim. We are losing capable, talented students as a result of this attitude. This does not require a complete upheaval of the university's system. It requires listening to those who are struggling and finding practical ways to

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Now when I notice that I’m not breathing properly, I inhale deeply and fill my entire body with air. I feel slightly better so I repeat it a couple of times. After a few minutes my mind feels calmer, clearer because I have taken the time to step outside my mind. I just need some headspace in order to keep my head above water, and I find that a few minutes of breathing deeply helps me personally beyond measure.

This is what a reading week would do for us students. It would give us a chance to pause and take a break from our incessant worries so that we can collect ourselves and rejuvenate. It would give us a chance to reset and rebalance. It would give us a chance to breathe.

I'm convinced that a week of relief from the relentless pace of l ife here would completely transform the Cambridge experience for many struggling students. It doesn't matter whether it would be spent playing catch­up, visiting family or just enjoying whatever aspects of this beautiful city tickle your fancy; it's a question of taking time to look after ourselves physically and emotionally. Why does such a celebrated academic institution continue to dismiss student welfare with so little empathy? We are humans, not machines, and we deserve to thrive. This is near impossible when we barely even have time to catch our breath.

I don’t know about you , but I need a breather. #endweek5blues

Annie

alleviate their anxiety, depression or whatever they are dealing with so they can participate actively and happily in their education. I appreciate that there are systems in place that do help. My tutor has been so helpful throughout this process and once I was able to ask for help, the University Counselling Service has also been very supportive. However, I recognise that I am lucky to have a helpful tutor and to be in a position to be able to seek help. It is not undermining the resources that already exist to push for better support. I do not profess to speak on behalf of everyone who has dealt with mental illness in Cambridge, but speaking from personal experience, a reading week is a practical change that would have helped me enormously. It would have allowed me to get my bearings and see my family. It would have slowed down the pace before the end of term. Cambridge can still maintain its reputation of academic excellence, while also listening to its students when they say they need help and taking practical steps to counter mental illness. We're not saying there is a magic wand the university can wave to banish all mental illness, but a reading week is a possible and practical step forward in supporting students who are struggling.

L. J. Banable

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For my first few years at Cambridge, whenever I saw my family during term time they would tell me I wasn’t breathing properly. I would pause for a moment to notice how my body felt, and I instantly became aware that my chest was tight, my jaw clenched, my limbs wracked with tension. For me, every single term without exception I arrived optimistic and spritely but my mental and physical health would take a turn for the worse around week 5. As a result by the end of term I was inevitably on my knees, burnt out with tired apathy; I felt smothered and I couldn’t breathe. The volume of work is only partly to blame ­ the rest comes from the insidious atmosphere of panic and pressure that penetrates all of us to some degree. In my case it was always the same: I spent several days in a sluggish, sad slump.

I don’t mean that flippantly ­ when I say sad I mean miserable. It was a debilitating combination of self­pity and self­loathing, with a dash of angry exhaustion thrown into the mix just for good measure. We all handle the stresses and pressures of Cambridge life differently, and it took me two years and a lot of soul searching to work out how not to let it suffocate me. I spent the summer after my first year genuinely considering dropping out, coming up with escape plans and dreams of alternate realities to just get me away somehow. But I came back and I’m extremely glad that I did, as I have since become incredibly resilient and have learnt how to give myself the love and respect that I deserve in this restless, and sometimes ruthless, place.

Breather

I remember the first time I realised that I wasn’t alone in dealing with mental health issues caused or exacerbated by the Natural Sciences Tripos. Five of us – all studying Physical NatSci (and, incidentally, all male apart from me) – stood outside Cindies at the end of Easter term last year and began to discuss our experiences. Every single person had encountered some form of ill mental health because of the course that year. This was shocking but, in retrospect, not particularly surprising. With the large number of contact hours, extremely high workload, and the belief that academic achievement is always the priority, the Cambridge Natural Sciences Tripos is a hotbed for mental health issues.When writing this article I asked for testimonies of others who are on this course. Naturally this resulted in a large selection bias; those who felt strongly, and often negatively, about the way the course operates were more likely to write a response. Even so, the sheer number of negative experiences I read was staggering, and should not be ignored or invalidated because others have had good experiences.The main criticism levied at the course is that “it treats students as if they were on a conveyor belt”, with lectures and practicals delivered in such intense 8-week bursts that “it is very difficult to find time for mental health”. Several bad days can leave a student chronically behind all term, leaving them to work through all the remaining material in the next vacation, when there are fewer staff available to contact for help.Only 67% of people feel that marking criteria (whether for supervisions or exams) were sufficiently explained: we are often just told to ‘try our best’. Does that justify pulling

Mental Health and the Natural Sciences Tripos

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Sarra

an all-nighter trying to solve one problem on a question sheet, only to be told that the question was wrong/impossible/not relevant come the supervision? In a similar vein, the idea that there is always a ‘trick’ to solving the problem is a damaging one.The multi-disciplinary structure of the course also means that it is very difficult to “really get stuck into one area of work”, and is therefore not conducive to those studying with OCD or attention deficit disorders. Frequently there is a lack of communication between departments, leading to several deadlines being set in the same week of term. One of my major grievances was the two exams (maths and chemistry) being set on the same day in first year. I didn’t feel like I had any energy left to complete the second exam to my satisfaction, and many others who took this very popular combination of courses felt the same.The structure does not favour collaborative working either (with both coursework and supervision questions intended to be individual undertakings), resulting in a high degree of isolation. This can in turn exacerbate the stress and anxiety caused by the course.The distance of some departments from the colleges and the lack of available housing out in the West Cambridge site also makes it difficult if you cannot cycle that day and don’t have disposable funds for buses or taxis. Practicals, particularly the longer ones in second year, can also pose access issues by assuming that every student is able-bodied enough to spend 4+ hours on their feet in a crowded laboratory.Some argue that the intensity of the workload and the focus on getting things ‘right’ is what makes Cambridge

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eating in front of others. Exposure to these social situations results in anxiety, to which a socially anxious person usually responds by developing safety behaviours that enable them to avoid the situation, such as turning upthirty minutes before an event so that there is no chance of others judging one for being late or never seeing a friend, even if they really want to. Those situations one does not avoid or cannot avoid are endured with intense feelings of anxiety or distress. Before the situation one worries about what others will think of them and how everything could go wrong; during the situation one is painfully aware of every tiny thing one does and how this could be or is interpreted negatively by others; after the event one dwells on all the things one thinks that one did wrong and how everyone must have noticed these things. Given that this is what social anxiety is and that I was socially anxious it should be expected that I would avoid the anxiety inducing situation of emailing my tutor to arrange a meeting, turning up to that meeting and  in that meeting actually telling my tutor that I was mentally ill. In fact, I had panic attacks when I did try to plan out in my head how to get help, which obviously only made me more anxious to try and receive help. This raises the problem with constructing a response to a student’s exam failure around them having previously informed college of their health problems. It is the nature of some illnesses that sufferers will not seek help or inform college. Yet people with these illnesses are ignored by the present system and punished simply for being unwell.

Oscar

special. If ‘special’ means the mental health of its students is jeopardised, I feel there are very few aspects of the course which can excuse this. Maintaining the status of ‘the best university in the UK’ is not worth the cost inflicted. Yes, we may have some of the best libraries and facilities available, and the intense workload may be well suited to some, but the very qualities sought after in interview candidates – high-achieving, perfectionist – are the same which put students at a higher risk of developing mental health disorders. ‘Real-world’ laboratories can indeed be very intense and stressful environments, but a researcher’s ability should not be compromised due to this, and efforts are made to remove the debilitating effect of stress. Cambridge should realise that the best work can never be performed under stress levels which affect the students’ mental health.Previously, when results are aired and students made aware of the high number of people with mental health issues within the university as a whole, Cambridge repeats that “the University has many services to help deal with this”, including the counselling service and college tutors. While this is true, the recently-published Whose University? and ‘Cambridge Speaks Its Mind’ testimonials prove that far too many colleges have outdated, unhelpful, and sometimes downright malicious welfare systems in place. Another problem is that the levels of stress, particularly on the NatSci course, are so normalised that many people don’t feel that they need to seek help. Crying and lack of sleep due to stress are seen as the natural result of ‘being a good student’.Many of the responses praised DoSes, tutors, or particular supervisors. Directors of Study have a duty to

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and demonstrating that I was taking steps to receive medical treatment. Getting a professional diagnosis in such a short space of time is not feasible on the NHS given the long waiting list for mental health care. Nor is it likely to be possible for a mentally ill person if they lack supportive close friends or family who are willing to do most of the work for them. After all, mentally ill people often struggle to perform simple daily tasks like getting out of bed, eating food or going outside, let alone actually making a GP appointment. Luckily for me, my mother was very supportive and I was able to gain a diagnosis from a private psychiatrist due to my father’s medical insurance. But the University cannot expect all students to be in such a position and should construct its procedures around those who are less fortunate. During this process I was frequently told it would have been easier if I had informed members of college before and that I really ought to have done so. This was said with all seriousness to someone who had just been diagnosed with social anxiety disorder. In uttering these words they demonstrated that, despite being responsible for my welfare, they were totally ignorant about a mental illness for which between 3% and 13% of the population will meet the diagnostic criteria at some time in their lives. To those who are ignorant, social anxiety disorder is not shyness. It consists in a persistent fear of certain social situations. What these situations are varies among socially anxious people. Some socially anxious people are afraid of talking on a telephone, while others are afraid of

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be available to discuss academic issues and provide the necessary support. In particular, they can help if a particular supervisor is not up to scratch: which often involves “go[ing] through the question on the board and ignoring what you wanted to learn”. Upsettingly, I and many others have also experienced sexist comments or behaviour during supervisions. This too is an issue that can, and should, be raised. No supervisor should be worth compromising your learning for, no matter how much respect they command in their field.However, many issues cannot be sorted with a short meeting with an academic or two. It’s therefore time to take a more active and involved approach. A reading week in the middle of term, as practiced by many other universities in the UK, would allow students time to catch up (or chill out and de- stress) with the benefit of remaining in college and close to the academics and resources necessary to study. It would also avoid any loss in academic content whilst also reducing time pressure and the stress induced by it, and the supervisors I received responses from felt that more time with students would be extremely useful in helping them to better understand the course.One last – but very important – point, which I wish someone had told me at the beginning of first year: take care of yourself and your friends. With such high rates of disordered mental health present on the course and in the university as a whole it’s extremely likely that you or someone you know studying the course will be affected during their time here. If it helps, do all of the things you’re told to do to alleviate the “Week 5 Blues”, but it’s ridiculous to pretend

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Exam Failure and Social Anxiety

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In first year I achieved a 2.1. In second year I was predicted by my supervisors to get a 2.1 or a 1st. I received a fail. I failed because I am mentally ill. The response by my college was not to inquire with me as to what had gone wrong. Instead, I received an email from my tutor telling me that I had failed and was therefore unable to proceed with my studies at Cambridge. The college, or at least my tutor, appears to operate on the assumption that if a student failed and did not prior to sitting their exams inform anyone in college about their long term mental health problems, then no such problems exist and so there is no need to ask the student as to why they failed their exams or listen to the student’s side of the story.   Instead, it appears to be assumed that if a student fails and has not informed college of any mental health problems, then the student is likely to have failed because they were either lazy and un-disciplined in their work or in some sense intellectually inept. This assumption clearly does not apply to me. I had suffered from undiagnosed depression and social anxiety disorder since doing my A levels and had never sought help. Upon reading the email from my tutor I had a mental breakdown. After doing so, I told my tutor out of desperation that I had failed because I was mentally ill. In response to this, I was given eighteen days to apply to have deemed to have deserved honours or DDH for short. Applying for DDH involves filling out and handing in several forms, getting a professional diagnosis from a psychiatrist and letters from my home and Cambridge GPs

that mental health issues are a minor ‘blip’ that can be confined to one week within a term. Be aware that you don’t have to answer each question perfectly before handing them in to your supervisor - actively turn the supervision into a learning experience instead.Students should never have to prioritise their work over their mental wellbeing.

Evie

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Useless Every day at Cambridge we are made to feel Useless

When we fail to get work in on time we are Useless

When we rush an essay to get it in on time we are Useless

When we compare ourselves to people who are coping we

are Useless

When we can't balance our hobbies with work we are

Useless

When we feel guilty about spending time with friends we

are Useless

When we burn out we are Useless

When we intermit we are Useless

When we drop out we are Useless

We attend "the best university in the world"  but still we

are Useless

But who are we supposed to be useful to?

We don't need to focus our efforts on being useful to a

system that deindividualises us

We are complete humans who go far beyond a mark on an

essay or a degree in a frame

Rowland Goodbody

TW: intermitting

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I’m not going to try and suppress the very real differences between a 21st-century university, the majority of whose inhabitants are drawn from the privileged classes, and a Victorian institution, part penal institution, part ‘charitable’ enterprise, populated overwhelmingly by working class and the physically and mentally disabled. There might, however, be some similarities - both institutions tend to produce a certain type of individual with a certain relationship to work and the world. In the process I hope to suggest that we need to think some more about work, especially the category of “hard work”, and what sort of positions we are able to imagine in relation to it. More importantly, what positions are becoming harder and harder to imagine? The Victorian workhouse was not designed to eliminate poverty, a state generally considered essential to the stability and vitality of an industrialised economy. Instead, a succession of administrative attempts from the 1830s revolved around the image of the ‘pauper’, working-class poor who were unable to support themselves. The technologies brought to bear on them were designed to rehabilitate the pauper, make them a useful member of society and a productive subject to a bourgeoning capitalist order. Historians have argued

Cambridge colleges, too, are built like forts. It is clichéd to note that these promote an insularity, a ‘town/gown’ divide that keeps the amorphous category of ‘the poor’ out; it is less common to note that they also tend to keep their inhabitants in. They are (fictional) self-sufficient communities in which we can sleep, eat, and work without ever leaving. Curfews ended comparatively recently (presumably made defunct by the advent of widely-available CCTV); Homerton still requires students to record their comings and goings after dark. The real weight of the university/workhouse parallel doesn’t come from the organisation of space, however. The workhouse is a case study not only of how power controls us, but how it limits our capacity to think up new relations to ourselves and our work. Cambridge will make us – the disabled, the idlers, the dreamers (everyone in this zine) – into paupers because it does not know what else to do with us. It, and an increasing majority of its students, cannot imagine a way out.

This is not total defeat. It probably never will be, because I don’t think it ever can be. Too many of us are so broken by these structures that we recognise that the cracks are in it, not in us. When hard work rejects us, we should reject it. Instead, we can look towards leading affirming lives on our own terms.

Johannes

This isn’t a fucking workhouse (but it might as well be)

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that beneath this image lay a pool of ‘able-bodies idlers and shirkers’ who made up the majority of the inhabitants of the workhouse, people whose existence was for the most part incomprehensible to 19th-century economists. There are undoubtedly traces of voices here, voices whose refusal to be easily assimilated into a world of productivity and hard work fell on the deaf ears of an administrative order to whom they were not only disruptive but made no sense.

In 1698, the Bristol Corporation for the Poor was founded by an Act of Parliament, setting a precedent for the countrywide establishment of workhouses that took place over the next century. At the same time, the demands of empire made themselves known in sweeping reforms of the Tripos system in Cambridge (from 1747) and the Schools system in Oxford (from 1800). Undergraduates from both universities were increasingly expected to fill posts in the imperial administrative structure, whether at home or abroad, and the reformed course structures reflected this demand for what had by the 19th century become a professionalised class of bureaucrats responsible for greasing the wheels of colonialism. They were designed as tests of masculinised vigour, as a crucible to produce the efficient administrators an empire requires. Examinations became a microcosm of the exoticised colonial venture, with students readily drawing

parallels between racist explorers of ‘dark continents’ and their own trials at university. The hard work of imperialism that awaited them in later life began here.

Jump forward a couple of centuries to 2015, and nothing has changed: ‘Cambridge education teaches you to be a responsible professional. But what does that mean? It means that we grow a work ethic and learn to think like adults’. The University must remain ‘good preparation for the real world’, which means, of course, demanding the kind of hard work that is necessary for ‘producing future leaders in all fields’ because ‘you cannot separate success from hard, gruelling, constant work.’ The coordinates of Britain’s empire have shifted in more ways than one. Cambridge no longer aims to produce administrators because the imperialism and colonialism of today no longer needs them. What it still relies upon, however, is hard work: the hard work of politicians, of bankers, of corporate lawyers, of leading intellectuals and artists. The veneration of hard work, of productivity, of the workhouse ethic, continually threatens to efface any alternative.

That’s why we should keep the idea of the workhouse in mind. Early workhouses were condemned for their architectural similarity to prisons – later architects learned to hide these effects, make their institutions pastoral in outlook.

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