Regulation and resistance in the smoking room at a mental health ward: Struggles for a space ‘in between’

This chapter explores the significance of the smoking room in a mental health ward in Denmark – as a place of struggle, regulation and resistance. The smoking room in the study constitutes space at once produced as 'other' and subject to discipline and regulation. Initially a hidden presence time became visible as an active participant in defining the smoking room; the time used in the smoking room turns out to be subject to regulation. At the same time the smoking room also becomes a platform for resistance, which allows for struggles to emerge for the right of access, ownership and self-determination. Mental health wards are not just 'clinical spaces' or places for treatment. Ward D occupied one floor in a building surrounded by other mental health wards, next to a middle-sized town in Denmark. A close analysis indicates that the conflict may be understood as a struggle about two fundamental aspects at a mental health ward: time and bodies.