Peer Support Institutionalization

Peer Support Institutionalization (2020 – 2023) is a project exploring the impact of embedding practices of consumer/survivor peer support and peer perspectives within mainstream mental health settings.

This series revolves around my MSW thesis exploring institutionalization through three dimensions of peer supporters’ everyday work: documentation work, de/valuing work, and values work.

It also includes three illustrated zines summarizing my thesis research findings, one journal article (forthcoming), and six presentations.

academic publications
(open access)

Calvin Prowse (2022). Troubling Peer Support Institutionalization: A Mad Institutional Ethnography; Or, Everyday Documentation, De/Valuing, & Values Work in Institutionalized Peer Support [MSW Thesis, McMaster University].

Calvin Prowse (manuscript in preparation). Work as Recovery: Peer Support and the Social Relations of Labour Extraction. Critical Disability Discourses.

“Instead of using documentation to construct a record of her peer’s experiences, Angela used documentation … as a tool to support and deepen the peer relationship.”

— Troubling Peer Support Institutionalization, p. 73

**Peer Support Institutionalization:**
**Troubling Documentation Work**, 2023

zines

The following zines are available for purchase through my shop, as well as a free digital download.

Peer Support Institutionalization: Troubling Documentation Work (2023)

Peer Support Institutionalization: Troubling De/Valuing Work (2023)

Peer Support Institutionalization: Facilitating Values Work (2023)

“Professionalism means having a community and culture that oversees, upholds, and protects the values, principles and standards of peer support, that allows us the opportunity and foundation to share our unique expertise and avoid peer drift and exploitation.”

— Tyrone Gamble, as quoted in
Troubling Peer Support Institutionalization, p. 93

presentations

Calvin Prowse (2023, Nov. 23). Peer Work Pasts / Presents / Futures. Social Work 2CC3, McMaster University.

Calvin Prowse (2023). Work as Recovery: Warning Signs of Dystopian Futures? PeerWorks Conference: Gathering Together, Dreaming Together, Transforming Together.

Calvin Prowse (2023, March 30). Engagement, Institutionalization, and the Future(s) of Peer Support. Social Work 744, McMaster University.

Calvin Prowse (2022). Peer Support Institutionalization: Troubling Everyday Work. Ontario Peer Development Initiative Conference: Gathering Together, Dreaming Together, Transforming Together.

Calvin Prowse (2021). Peer Support Professionalization: Praxis or Peer Drift? Flash Presentations: Critical Disability Research & Teaching Cluster, McMaster University.

Peer Support Documentation: Praxis or Peer Drift? (2021). Ontario Peer Development Initiative.