Tiny Theory
A growing collection of zines exploring mental health, philosophy, neurodiversity, disability studies, mad studies, neuroqueer theory, trauma, identity, and the ways we become ourselves together.
What is Tiny Theory?
Tiny Theory is a practice of translating ideas into something you can hold in your hands.
Each illustrated zine explores an idea that has shaped the way I understand ourselves, one another, and the worlds we inhabit. Rather than simplifying complexity, the goal is to make complexity more approachable, more shareable, and more alive in everyday conversations.
Zines are wonderfully small. They fit in your pocket, get folded open on a kitchen table, passed between friends, tucked into waiting rooms, and revisited years later.
I love them because they invite participation. They're tactile, imperfect, and deeply human. They make room for unfinished thoughts, sketches, questions, and conversation.
In a world that often asks us to be certain, polished, and complete, zines remind us that ideas can also be handmade, evolving, and shared.
Why Zines?
Browse the Collection
Who Decides What’s Wrong.
Tiny Theory No. 1
What if the problem isn’t you?
An exploration of the Medical Model, Social Model, and the quiet politics of who gets labeled disordered.
A radical reframe: Maybe your distress makes sense.
What Labels Do.
Tiny Theory No. 2
A map is a paper. You are terrain.
An exploration of diagnosis, labels, power, access, stigma, and relief. Without demonizing or romanticizing.
Naming matters.
So does who does the naming.
Difference Not Deficit.
Tiny Theory No. 3
Defect is often a story told by environments that refuse to change.
Not all brains are meant to work the same way. The neurodiversity paradigm recognizes this natural variation and reframes difference as diversity, not deficit.
This is not toxic positivity.
This is contextual liberation.
Neuroqueering.
Tiny Theory No. 4
Bending minds.
Breaking norms.
Making space.
An exploration of masking, queerness, normativity, and the politics of being “too much” in a world built for sameness.
You are not broken for being nonlinear.
The Myth of the Regulated Self.
Tiny Theory No. 5
Bodies are real. So are systems.
An exploration of nervous systems, regulation, embodiment, and the politics of “functioning”.
Bodies are shaped by experience.
Experience is shaped by the world we move through.
Our bodies adapt: to care, to harm, to possibility.
The Myth of the Unified Self.
Tiny Theory No. 6
We are not one thing.
We are many things moving together.
Sometimes in harmony. Sometimes not.
An exploration of multiplicity, internal conflict, adaptation, and the myth of the singular self.
And still there is continuity. Not because we are singular. But because we are in relation.
→ Download Coming Soon…
The Border of Sanity.
Tiny Theory No. 7
Coming Soon…
Tiny Theory is meant to be shared. Download and print as many as you'd like for yourself, friends, clients, classrooms, or community spaces. If you've never folded a mini zine before, here's a quick video tutorial to get you started.
If you'd prefer printed copies, you can send $1 per zine to @merle-maynard on Venmo with your mailing address, and I'll mail them your way.