CFP: Society for Disability Studies (15-18 June 2011, San José, CA)

CALL FOR PAPERS

Society for Disability Studies
23rd Annual Conference
San José California, Doubletree Hotel
June 15-18, 2011

Beyond Access: From Disability Rights to Disability Justice
Deadline for submissions: December 15, 2010
http://www.disstudies.org

[Disability justice is] not self-sufficiency but self-determination, not independence but interdependence, not functional separateness but personal connection, not physical autonomy but human community.
--Paul K. Longmore

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, and 2008 witnessed both the passage of the ADA Amendments Act and, on the international stage, the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (CRPD). In passing the ADA Amendments Act, the U.S. Congress sought to redress nearly twenty years of rulings that severely narrowed the scope of protections afforded in the original bill. The Convention formally marks a paradigm shift towards considering people with disabilities as subjects who must be able to exercise their own rights, rather than objects of medical inquiry or charitable intervention. These developments seem to suggest gains in the history of disability rights, and yet many disability activists contend that real gains can only be made if disability is conceptualized as part of an intersecting network of historic and contemporary power structures that must be addressed holistically and systemically.

We invite conference participants to reconsider the issues of rights and access in light of local, national and global commitments and resistance to achieving disability justice. We offer the following broad questions in a variety of disciplines and encourage interdisciplinary perspectives:

* How is social justice conceptualized? What competing visions emerge within these conceptualizations?
* What tensions have hampered social justice gains for people with disabilities?
* How might disability-based conceptualizations of social justice complicate and enhance other issues of social justice?
* How have coalitional politics shaped momentum---or barriers---to achieving disability justice?
* How do various technologies---and access to them---shape coalitions and enhance or hinder progress?
* How are or how can societies address the enduring poverty that people with disabilities face throughout the world? How does poverty shape / limit access to opportunities?
* How might institutions and agencies be transformed to better ensure justice for individuals with disabilities and their communities?
* How might community engagement serve the cause of enhancing disability justice?
* How does cultural context shape a local agenda for rights and access?
* How does the intersection of disability studies with other critical scholarship (critical race studies, gender/feminist studies, queer studies, immigrant studies, post-colonial studies) promote more nuanced understandings of social justice?
* How can and how do liberatory textual and / or performative practices enact disability justice?
* What liberatory moments, paradigms, practices, and aspirations have shaped the path(s) towards disability justice?

We welcome proposals in all areas of disability studies, as well as submissions premised on this year's theme.

(See the website for the rest of the call, which is mostly logistical information about the proposal submission process.)

October 25: Grace Padaca (b. 1963)

"I am Grace Padaca. I share my story because I know there are many who are like me, not big people, not rich, not strong. I know there are many like me whose strength is inside."

--from a campaign appearance by Grace Padaca

Above: Gracia Cielo "Grace" Magno Padaca, former Governor of Isabela Province in the Philippines, standing on a stage while a group of other people are seated in a row behind her. Padaca was elected governor in 2004, was reelected in 2007, and was defeated in another bid for reelection, earlier this year.

Padaca survived polio in her early childhood, and uses crutches (seen in the photograph above). Padaca was valedictorian of her high school class and graduated with highest honors from college. Before politics, she worked as a radio journalist. In 2008, she won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Government Service. Today is her 47th birthday.

"Polio" by Staff Benda Bilili

There's an article about a Congolese band in the LA Times today. The band is named Staff Benda Bilili, and they're the subject of a recent documentary, because most of the men in the band are physically disabled. (The print version of the article has more groaningly cliched headlines than the online version. You can probably imagine them.)

They were a street band in Kinshasa when they were discovered. Some of their songs are about disability, including this one, "Polio":




The visuals are of members of the band singing, playing music, and being assisted by groups of children to move their wheelchairs over dirt roads. It's clear that some of their chairs are built from parts of motorcycles, wagons, carts, and bicycles. Some of the scenes also include men using crutches. Some of the daylight scenes are filmed outside a disability assistance center, according to the signage. The notes say that the performance sections of the video were made at the zoo in Kinshasa.

The lyrics aren't in English, but there are English subtitles translating them:

I was born as a strong man but polio crippled me
Look at me today, I'm screwed into my tricycle
I have become the man with the canes
The hell with those crutches!

Parents, please go to the vaccination center
Get your babies vaccinated against polio
Please save them from that curse

My parents had the good idea to register me for school
Look at me now: I'm a well-educated person
which enables me to work and support my family

Parents please don't neglect your children
The one who is disabled is no different from the others
(why should he?)
Treat all your children without discrimination
(don't throw anyone on the side)
Who among them will help you when you're in need?
God only knows who

New Play: "Journeys of Identity"

From a recent announcement on H-Connecticut and H-Disability. If you're in New England and get a chance to see this, let us know what you thought!

The National Theatre of the Deaf and Connecticut’s Old State House present
Journeys of Identity

Hartford, CT - Journeys of Identity, a new play by Garrett Zuercher, brings to life the story of Thomas Gallaudet, founder of the nation’s first school for the Deaf, Laurent Clerc, its first teacher and Alice Cogswell, its first student as they struggle to overcome the obstacles and prejudices faced by Deaf Americans in 1817. Journeys of Identity will premiere at Connecticut’s Old State House on October 14, 15 and 17. This new play chronicles the creation of American Sign Language and the American School for the Deaf - events that transformed the nation’s attitudes on Deafness and education in the U.S.

Journeys of Identity has been written to be performed in the unique award-winning style of theatre created by the National Theatre of the Deaf where every word is seen and heard by the entire audience. Thursday, October 14 has been designated American School for the Deaf Day by Governor M. Jodi Rell. The first general public performance will be on Friday, October 15 at 9:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., followed by a 1 p.m. Sunday matinee and 4 p.m. afternoon performance on October 17. There is a special discount ticket price of $8 for students and seniors while general admission is $15 and includes a tour of the Old State House.

Tickets can be purchased at The Bushnell box office by calling (860) 987-5900. Groups of 10 or more should call 860-236-4193. For more information visit www.ctoldstatehouse.org for more information on ticket sales and prices.

Rebecca Taber-Conover
Connecticut's Old State House
Programming and Curriculum Manager
800 Main Street
Hartford, CT 06103
860-522-6766, ext. 11

Disability Blog Carnival #70 is up NOW!

[visual description: Disability Blog Carnival logo featuring an old patent drawing of a back brace, with "the Disability Blog Carnival: a bracing event" superimposed in blue text]

Yes, #70.

Astrid has gathered up and organized a wonderful collection of links around the theme of "identity," with tantalizing extracted quotes that will have you clicking to read more. Thank you, Astrid.

Next month's edition will be hosted by lilwatchergirl at Through Myself and Back Again. At least, that's what the schedule said back in June. I'll confirm asap and point to any further announcements about this.

Stony Brook University's Center For Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care, And Bioethics To Offer Masters Track Beginning Spring 2011

Program serves students from a wide range of academic disciplines and professional backgrounds

STONY BROOK, N.Y., September 14, 2010 Press Release – Stony Brook University is now accepting applications for its Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care, and Bioethics track in the Master of Arts in Biological Sciences. Courses begin in the spring 2011 semester. Named for the Center for Medical Humanities, Compassionate Care and Bioethics founded in 2008, the new MA track will serve students from a wide range of disciplines and professions.

The 30-credit masters track can be completed in one to three years. The Center encourages MA applicants from a variety of backgrounds, including nursing, social work, ministry, journalism, philosophy, humanities, the social and life sciences, administration, business, the arts, law, public policy, religious studies, and others. Applicants who hold a baccalaureate degree without professional experience are welcome, as are clinicians and other professionals.

"Seasoned professionals, medical students and undergrads who just finished up and want do something for a year before marching on to law school or medical school will find this track of great interest,” said Center Director, Dr. Stephen G. Post.

Situated in the Department of Preventive Medicine in the School of Medicine, the Center is equally attentive to the three thematic components in its name. It builds on a commitment to medical humanism and ethics that has defined education for Stony Brook students over three decades.

"This is a Center in which the human side of medicine is elevated, examined, and revered," said Dr. Post. "It provides students an education not just in the dilemmas of bioethics, but in medical humanities centered on the experiences of patients. We want students to see patients as more than biological puzzles. We want them to be aware of the importance of relationships and compassion in the art of healing. It’s the loss of care in this most basic sense that is currently being singled out across the United States as the most pressing concern not only of patients, but of physicians and other healthcare professionals."

More information on the Center for Humanities, Compassionate Care and Bioethics and the masters track can be found on the program site. For more information, contact DS,TU editor Michael L. Dorn.

Why I love biographical dictionaries (#3)

For earlier installments in the series, see #1 and #2.

Again, the Australian Dictionary of Biography comes through with a winning disability-related snippet:

Although she dressed 'carelessly in skirts and sweaters', Dreyer had 'a passion for ornate drop earrings and exotic perfumes'. Humorous and warm hearted, she gave an annual party for 'Annabella', her wooden leg.

That would be from the entry on writer and journalist Marien Oulton Dreyer (1911-1980), who used a prosthetic leg from her childhood. She wrote a script for the Australian Broadcasting Commission in 1951 called "Story of a Lame Duck" which was "largely autobiographical," and another script in 1953 about tuberculosis recovery from the patient's perspective.