“Somebody Get Me Some Prozac!”: Trivializing Language and the Stigma of Drug Brand Names

This study looks at a selection of newspaper content from 1995 to 2024 that mentions the names of SSRI drugs in passing as jokes, metaphors, or cultural references. These passing mentions of SSRIs are analyzed via qualitative textual analysis, considering stigma and trivialization. The results of the study suggest that stereotypes about SSRIs have been cemented via popular discourse and media coverage and persist today despite nearly 40 years of prescriptions. Mentions of the SSRI drugs in passing suggest the illusion of a post-Prozac society where mental illness has been “fixed” and therefore can be trivialized with little consequence. This work expands upon existing theoretical concepts to propose a new theoretical model—a continuum of trivialization and stigma which may aid researchers in parsing the ways that colloquialization, trivialization and stigma interact and overlap in media texts.