Disability Studies News and Events

New - 5/08/08

- "Dennis Lang Student Award in Disability Studies"

The "Dennis Lang Student Award in Disability Studies" was announced by
Professor  Paul Miller, Director of the UW Disability Studies Program, at
the "Framing Legal and Human Rights Strategies for Change: A Case Study of
Disability Rights in Asia," symposium:

    The Disability Studies Program at the University of Washington, together
with members of the Disability Community throughout Washington State, have
established and endowed the "Dennis Lang Student Award in Disability
Studies."  We've done this to to honor the steadfast leadership of Dennis in
pursuing a strong and growing disability studies presence throughout all of
the University of Washington campuses.  The award will be made available
each year to a UW undergraduate student and/or graduate student who
demonstrate excellence in disability studies. We know many of you have
worked with, and continue to collaborate with Dennis on many fronts.  We
invite you to join us in helping this critical scholarship grow in the
Northwest.

    Checks can be made out to the UW Foundation (memo line: Lang student
award) and mailed to UW Foundation, Box 358240, Seattle, WA 98195); on-line
donations accepted at http://uwfoundation.org (search on Lang student
award), or by phone at 1-877-894-4387 (specify Lang student award).

- Rosemarie Garland-Thomson to Speak as Part of the Disability Awareness Week Activities (May 19 - 23, 2008)

Thursday, May 22nd
11:00am - 1:00pm "Integrating Disability Studies into the University" - HUB 310
5:30pm - 7:00pm "Picturing People with Disabilities" - Johnson 102

Rosemarie Garland-Thomson is Professor of Women's Studies at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. Her fields of study are feminist theory, American literature, and disability studies. Her scholarly and professional activities are devoted to developing the field of disability studies in the humanities and in women's studies. She is the author of Staring: How We Look (Oxford UP, forthcoming 2008), Extraordinary Bodies: Figuring Physical Disability in American Literature and Culture (Columbia UP, 1997); editor of Freakery: Cultural Spectacles of the Extraordinary Body (NYU Press, 1996), and co-editor of Disability Studies: Enabling the Humanities (MLA Press, 2002). She is currently writing a book called Cure or Kill: The Cultural Logic of Euthanasia , which traces eugenic thought through American literature. Professor Garland-Thomson will be speaking:

Disability Awarenes Week Activities are sponsored by the ASUW Student Disability Commission & Co-sponsored by the ASUW Women's Action Committee. Other events:

Kelly from Babeland: Sexability - Disability and Sex
Monday, May 19th 5:00pm - 7:00pm
Mary Gates Hall 082A

Joelle Bruner: ADA Restoration Act
Tuesday, May 20th 5:00pm - 7:00pm
HUB 204N

"BODY" - Art and Disability
Wednesday, May 21th 1:00pm - 3:00pm
HUB 209A

Celebration Party
Friday, May 23rd 4:00pm - 6:00pm
Mary Gates Hall 295

New - 4/10/08

The Disability Studies Program at the University of Washington is pleased present our Spring 2008 Speakers Series. This series highlights the breadth and depth of the field, offering a multi-disciplinary lens through which to explore contemporary issues in disability studies. By creating a forum featuring scholarly work from a wide-range of disciplines, we endeavor to build engagement that sustains an on-going dialogue and fosters critical inquiry into the many contexts that contour disability in society and culture.

All events are free and to open to the public.

Upcoming Events:

Touching Histories: Personality and Disability in Sex Studies of the 1930s

Thursday, May 1, 2008 - 4:00 PM

UW Communication 120

David Serlin is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of California , San Diego , where he is also affi­liated faculty in Critical Gender Studies and Science Studies. He is the author of, Replaceable You: Engineering the Body in Postwar America , which was awarded the 2005 Alan Bray Book Prize by the Modern Language Association; the coeditor of two anthologies, Policing Public Sex: Queer Politics and the Future of AIDS Activism and Artificial Parts, Practical Lives: Modern Histories of Prosthetics ; and the editor of the forthcoming Imagining Illness: Public Health and Visual Culture .

Touching Histories investigates a set of psychological and anatomical studies conducted by Carney Landis, a colleague of Alfred Kinsey's, on a group of young disabled women living in the New York City metropolitan region during the late 1930 s. The results of Landis's work arguably set the stage for studies in the 1940 s and 1950 s that linked the psychic properties of personality deficiency together with those of sexual deficiency. Serlin's presentation explores the significance Landis accorded to the developmental aspects of touch and tactility among these women and their care-givers, and how Landis deployed the category of touch within discussions of disability, personality, and sexual subjectivity.

This event was made possible with generous support from the Simpson Center for the Humanities at the University of Washington .

Disability and Rights to Health: The UN Convention

Tuesday, May 13, 2008 - 12:00 PM

Communications 202

Jerome E. Bickenbach is a Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Faculties of Law and Medicine at Queen's University, and Queen's Research Chair in the Department of Philosophy. He is one of the foremost international authorities on ethical, philosophical, and legal issues in disability policy. The application of his analysis of disability has illuminated the review and revision of major World Health Organization initiatives in health assessment, culminating in the development of the International Classification of Functioning. He is the author of numerous publications including, Physical Disability and Social Policy and Canadian Cases in the Philosophy of Law ; and the coeditor of Quality of Life and Human Differ­ence: Genetic Testing, Healthcare and Disability .

For more information please contact Julie Myers at myaj@u.washington.edu

New - 4/08/08

Pac Rim Conference On Disability Dates
April 14 & 15, 2008
Sheraton Waikiki Hotel & Resort

http://www.pacrim.hawaii.edu/

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University of Washington

International Symposium in Seattle to Address Disability Human Rights April 24-25

Join us for an important and groundbreaking symposium addressing international disability human rights law and the civil rights of people with disabilities world-wide.  The symposium, “Framing Legal and Human Rights Strategies for Change: A Case Study of Disability Rights in Asia,” will be held April 24-25 at the University of Washington (UW) School of Law in Seattle, WA and is sponsored by the UW Disability Studies Program and the UW Asian Law Center in partnership with the Henry M. Jackson Foundation.  Support has also been provided by the Disability Funders Network. 

Topics of discussion will include the UN Convention on Disability Rights and how they impact domestic norms;  disability citizenship and integration into society;  international disability lawyering and advocacy;  disability law after conflict;  integrating people with disabilities into developing economies;  global health, human rights and disability;  and the funder community's perspective on the future of disability human rights.  There are confirmed speakers from eight countries and throughout the United States.

The goal of the symposium is to explore the issue of disability rights in both a legal and human rights context within Asia.  An examination of the Asian experience with these issues provides an opportunity to explore their application in a broad and diverse setting of different historical and legal contexts, environments, economies and forms of government. 

The symposium is intended to reach an audience of academics, scholars, policy makers, human rights professionals, lawyers, advocates, foundations, and business leaders.  The panel presentations will include time for audience discussion.

Following the symposium, on Saturday, April 26 th , there will be an optional advocacy meeting that will be open to symposium attendees, speakers and the public to discuss strategies to support ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities.

· Please register online by April 10 th [ www.uwcle.org ]

· Symposium schedule and brochure for "Framing Legal and Human Rights Strategies for Change: A Case Study of Disability Rights in Asia"  (PDF format) [ http://www.uwcle.org/disability_rights_asia_2008.pdf ]

· Symposium schedule and brochure for "Framing Legal and Human Rights Strategies for Change: A Case Study of Disability Rights in Asia"  (accessible format, Word DOC) [ http://www.uwcle.org/Accessible_Version_Brochure_2003.doc ]

· Questions? Email : uwcle@u.washington.edu or call (800) CLE-UNIV or ( 206) 543-0059

· To request a disability accommodation, please contact the Disability Services Office at least ten days in advance at: (206) 543-6450 (voice); (206) 543-6452 (TTY); (206) 685-7264 (fax); or dso@u.washington.edu (email).

Sara Goering, (Department of Philosophy) will be the first presenter for a series of talks presented by the Disability Studies Program at the University of Washington. Her lecture, "Rethinking the impairment/disability distinction" will take place Friday, Feb. 29, 2008 at noon in the Law School, located Room 115. - The Disability Studies Steering Committee will meet from 1:30 - 3:30 following the brown bag talk.

This hour long event will be fairly informal, and will offer time for discussion and questions following Prof. Goering's presentation.

Other upcoming events include:
Jose Alaniz, (Department of Comparative Literature), Friday, March 14, 2008 at noon

David Serlin, (Department of Communications, UCSD), Thursday, May 1, 2008 at 4:00 PM

Jerome Bickenbach, (Department of Philosophy, Queen's University), Wednesday , May 13, time to be announced


If you are interested in presenting research as part of this series, it is not too late to be added to the schedule. Contact Julie Myers, myaj@u.washington.edu , if you would like to be a presenter, or if have a good idea for a speaker doing work in the field of Disability Studies.

Deaf Studies ASL 305 has been added to the DS Minor course list. Please contact Lance A Forshay: lforshay@u.washington.edu

Stay tuned for a new and better web site!! Presently under construction.

From Phyllis M. Wise, UW Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs:

I am delighted to announce the appointment of Professor Paul S. Miller as
the Director of the Disability Studies Program at the University of
Washington, effective September 16, 2006.  Professor Miller is the Henry M.
Jackson Professor of Law at the UW Law School and an internationally
renowned expert in disability law.

Professor Miller's scholarly interests include disability law, employment
discrimination, and genetics and the law, and he has published extensively
in each of these areas.  Before coming to the UW, Professor Miller had a
distinguished career in public service, having served for ten years as
commissioner of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, as the
White House Liaison to the Disability Community, and as a disability civil
rights attorney.

We are grateful to Professor Miller for taking on this important
responsibility.  I would also like to thank Dennis Lang, Affiliate
Instructor in Rehabilitation Medicine, for having served as an informal
director and inspiration to disability studies at the UW.  We look forward
to his continued close involvement with the program.

The Disability Studies Program is truly an interdisciplinary effort that
cuts across our many colleges and program. I would like to express my
appreciation to the College or Arts and Sciences, the School of Law, and the
School of Social Work for their support of this effort.

Welcome Paul!