Yesterday I had the distinct pleasure of delivering a presentation at the Aurora City Hall as part of an accessibility celebration happening in the city. A small but engaged crowd of citizens and city councillors heard my presentation before offering up their own opinions and advice on how to make Aurora a more accessible city. This event was particularly memorable for me because it was a group of people (including the Mayor) getting together to make Aurora as accessible as possible, not just meet the baseline of access as required by the AODA. We need more progressive cities like Aurora!
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Komoka Scouts Troop
I took a trip west of London tonight to speak to a Scouts troop based out of Komoka. It’s always a great time heading to the country and spending time in lovely small towns like Komoka. The Scouts were an excellent audience and had some really great questions about life with a disability. Thank you to the Scout leaders for inviting me out and I hope to see you again soon.
This morning I presented a paper on the medical industrial complex at the “Cripples, Idiots, Lepers, and Freaks: Extraordinary Bodies / Extraordinary Minds” Conference at CUNY. Focused on representations of disability in Science Fiction, my panel also featured two tremendous papers presented by Eric Wallenstein (Texas University) and Jeffry Iovannone (SUNY Buffalo). Some early highlights of this conference so far was hanging out with Dr. Beth Haller (writer of this great book on disability and media) and Dr. Rosemarie Garland-Thomson (whom the conference was titled after). I also got to meet one of my person heroes, Simi Linton, which was amazing.
I had the honour of keynoting the “Reclaiming Our Bodies and Minds Conference” at Ryerson this morning, presenting on the medical industrial complex and resistance to ableism. It was great seeing some old friends at the conference who drove down from Ottawa for the con and I made some lovely new friends. I love going to events like this because it’s so energizing to see so many people fighting for disability rights in our community.
A huge thank you to the organizers of the event for inviting me and big ups to Jenny Blaser for all her hard work putting this great event together!
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Night of Heroes event
Although not a “speaking engagement” so to speak, tonight I was asked to be a part of Community Living London’s “Night of Heroes” fundraiser. I was teamed up with my old friend Mark Anderson (who I met on the London Accessibility Advisory Committee at City Hall many moons ago) to strut down the runway in a pseudo fashion show that was more about dancing then being particularly fashionable…which is a good thing because we all know I’m not the most fashionable gent out there. Unfortunately, I’m not much of a dancer either and was definitely shown up by the Mayor of Sarnia, Mike Bradley. That guy can really cut a rug.
A great night, through and through, with a ton of money raised for a great cause.
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Keynote at York University
Yesterday I was in Toronto, giving a keynote presentation on creative resistance and the disability movement entitled “Battle Lines Drawn.” The presentation went off without a hitch to a near-packed auditorium, including several security guards who may or may not have been under the impression I was intending on literally blowing up a few stairwells at York. Whoops. After the presentation I had the pleasure of delivering a private guest lecture to students in the Critical Disability Studies program, who were full of challenging questions about my research.
Huge thanks to Kaley Roosen and her planning team for putting on this fabulous event and I look forward to coming back sometime in the near future for some more stair bombing!
This week I had the chance to screen “Idling: A Transit Story” at Ryerson University and deliver a short presentation about my trip to Ottawa in ’08. After the presentation I accompanied some students around campus for some good ol’ fashion stairbombing before calling it a day. Huge thank you to Ryerson for being so supportive and I look forward to seeing you in the new year at the RyeACCESS conference.
As a part of “Social Justice Week,” Jeff’s documentary “Idling: A Transit Story” will be screened on Tuesday, November 2nd at Carleton University, followed by a short Q & A with Jeff.
“Idling” is an exploration into the world of accessible transportation in Ontario and chronicles Jeff’s marathon to Ottawa in 2008. The trailer for the doc can be seen on YouTube.
When: November 2, 2011 @ 6pm
Where: University Centre Atrium (4th floor), Carleton University
RSVP: Here on Facebook
This past weekend I was at the Youth Activist Forum, put together by Citizens with Disabilities — Ontario (CWD-O). Presenting a workshop on my webcomic and creative resistance and a keynote on my trip to Ottawa in ’08, it was great spending time with some young activists out to change the world. A huge thanks to Chrissy, Dale and Erika for inviting me to take part in this great event and a warm hello to all my new friends from the conference. You can see a comic strip I put together about the conference here.
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New Episode of Cripz — Starring Role
A lot has been made of the fact that most disabled characters on television and in movies are actually played by able-bodied actors. It’s a particularly tricky question because while you’d like to believe casting directors aren’t avoiding disabled actors simply because they don’t think they can perform, it’s been noted by many in the industry that there is a perception that disabled actors are more “expensive” than those without disabilities. This is because, rightfully so, it takes longer for these actors to do wardrobe changes and sets now need to be fully accessible to accomodate the actors needs.
The frustrating part though is that in an industry focused on “the right look and fit,” disabled actors are type casted into playing disabled character…except they can’t get those roles for reasons listed above.
That’s where this week’s episode of Cripz is coming from, in the first of a three part holiday series entitled “Starring Role.”