People. People. I cannot even tell you how excited I am. In November-December in New South Wales, the awesome-est state in Australia[1. My esteemed co-blogger Lauredhel might disagree with me there.], we have a little something called the Don’t DIS My ABILITY campaign. There are loads of events run around the state leading up to the International Day of People with a Disability.
My personal favourite bit is the campaign magazine, Made You Look. You may remember that Lauredhel wrote about playground accessibility for disabled parents for the magazine last year. This year, Ouyang Dan and I both contributed pieces. OYD’s is on ableist language and is called “Think before you speak,” mine are “Type (re)Cast,” about popular culture representations of PWD, and “Seen and not heard,” on my experiences of being young and disabled. If you’re in NSW, you can pick up a hardcopy at your local library, all over Sydney and at loads of regional newsagencies (full list of places you can obtain the mag here). If you are elsewhere, you can download a copy, in one go or in sections, if that’s easier.
But that’s not all! Check out the Don’t DIS blog. I’m going to be writing there over the next month about such topics as who gets to speak about disability advocacy, narratives of disabled laziness, where conversations about disability tend to stop, body image while disabled and what respecting disabled people means. You yourself can participate: check out this post about blogging for the campaign here.
It’s going to be a fabulous month, readers.