Category Archives: events

Signal Boost: The Attitude Test discusses Screen Readers TODAY

events, signal boost

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On this week’s Attitude Test, we will, as usual take a look at the news and put our distinctive slant thereon, all ready for you to disagree with if you want to.

The main subject this week concerns screenreaders.

The simple question, though with, I feel some complicated answers is: are we witnessing the demise of the stand-alone screenreader such as JAWS and Window-Eyes? With Apple now putting a screenreader in many of their products as a standard part of their system, is this the way things will go.

Is there much left for the major screenreader manufacturers to do? A new version of JAWS is coming soon, but most of what has been done in this new version are fixes to existing problems. Could it be that Microsoft may well decide to incorporate one of the major screenreaders into their own products?

We want your views on this.

You can interact with the program in several ways: either by skype at
the.global.voice, by email and msn at yourvoice@theglobalvoice.info, or by using one of our three phone numbers you can find on our website:
The Global Voice.

That’s the Attitude Test live on Sunday at 18:00 UTC, that’s 2 pm Eastern, 11 am Pacific in the US, 7 pm in the UK and 8 pm in Central Europe

Let your voice be heard on the Attitude Test, on the one and only Global Voice.

Weekly Events Roundup

Event Roundups, events

As always, these events are not endorsed by us in any way, and unfortunately I can’t tell you any more about them than what is at the applicable links.

Also, things are a little wonky on my end because of Hurricane Earl, but both Don and I are fine, having made it back to our apartment during a lull in the storm. But I’m a bit scattered right now!

Memorial Events (All in North America) – Conferences (All in Europe) – Art Show/Call for Submissions of Art (All in North America)

Memorial Events:

Canada:

Unveiling Ceremony
Memorial Wall Plaques Dedicated to Patient Labourers Past

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the oldest part of the patient built boundary wall, constructed in 1860, which stands on the south side of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) at 1001 Queen Street West, Toronto. These patient-built walls, along with the 1888-89 walls on the east and west sides, are a testament to the abilities of people whose unpaid labour was central to the operation of asylums in the Province of Ontario during the 19th & 20th centuries.

Join us as we unveil a series of nine memorial plaques in remembrance.

Saturday, September 25, 2010 at 1:00 p.m.
Corner of Queen Street West and Shaw Street.

A tour of the wall and all nine plaques will follow the dedication ceremony.

Sponsored by Psychiatric Survivor Archives, Toronto (PSAT), CAMH,
and the generous support of many community donors.

For more information or media inquiries, please call 416-595-6015; 416-661-9975. (via NEADS)

Conferences:

United Kingdom

The Lancaster Disability Studies Conference is taking place 7-9th September 2010. Over 150 presenters will be giving papers and showing posters.

There will be a live webcast of the keynote sessions which can be can be viewed at http://www.lancs.ac.uk/iss/digital/disability/
The recordings will also be made available on the conference website afterwards http://www.lancs.ac.uk/disabilityconference/

Tuesday 7 September 2010
11.30-12.30 Plenary – Caroline Gooding
17.30-18.30 Plenary – Liz Crow

Wednesday 8 September 2010
9.30-10.30 Plenary – Ruth Gould
13.30-14.30 Plenary – Adolf Ratzka

Thursday 9 September 2010
11.30-12.30 Plenary – Alana Officer

Details about the plenary talks and the full book of abstracts are available on the conference website.

Registration is open for the Currents in the Mainstream conference:

The MeCCSA Disability Studies Network presents a conference on current images of disability at De Montfort University, Leicester on the 22nd September from 9-30/10.00 until 4-30. This day conference aims to re-visit and re-evaluate the complex issues at stake in contemporary representations of disability and impairment from a variety of critical perspectives, investigating both continuities and new trends in representing disability.

Presenters include Paul Darke, Debs Williams and Sonali Shah.Papers
/presentations will include work on televison, film, journalism and
performance. For more details please see Currents in the Mainstream

Amsterdam:

Conference: ‘Diversity in Quality of Life’
December 2-4 2010
VU University, Amsterdam

Disability Studies in Nederland wants to celebrate its first anniversary and the start of its research program with an international conference in cooperation with VU University, which supports this event as part of the lustrum agenda Freedom and Responsibility, on occasion of its 130th birthday. To promote the disability studies approach in The Netherlands the conference will focus on a key concept in mainstream academic approaches to disability, namely ‘quality of life’. It raises the question of how this concept can be used in a disability studies perspective.

Slovenia:

ENIL invites you to an international conference co-organized with YHD (Association for the culture and theory of handicap), 8 & 9 September 2010, Ljlubljana, Slovenia

The conference will be implemented under the
EDFEO programme for the year 2010 (European driving force for equal opportunities), within which YHD is coordinating the Eastern European group.

Location: City Hotel, Dalmatinova 15, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia.

There’s more information at the ENIL website (scroll down).

Art Show:

United State

Mad Gifts: An Art Show
What:

An exhibition of inspired artwork by Icaristas throughout the Northeast; a celebration of our visionary talents and community; a fundraiser; and an opportunity to share TIP with others.

When:

November 5, 2010 – December 7, 2010

Opening Reception: Friday, November 5, 7PM-9PM

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS: October 1

Feel free to keep us updated on events!

Web Event: Accessible World Tek Talk presents Dean Martineau discussing Speech Recognition, July 19, 2010

events, signal boost

Would you like to write documents by speaking to your computer, rather than typing, or are you somebody who needs to perform all your computer operations with little or no use of your hands? While still challenging, these feats are becoming ever more possible with the steady improvement of speech recognition technology.

Dean Martineau will provide an overview of the available resources to make this all possible on Tek Talk on July 19 at 5:00 P.M. Pacific Time, 8:00 P.M. Eastern time, 00:00 Tuesday GMT. He will provide guidelines to help you evaluate which of the available speech recognition options might be for you, and will demonstrate some aspects of them. This will be an opportunity for you to learn about the state of the art in speech recognition as it pertains to the blind, and to ask questions about your own situation.

Presenter: Dean Martineau
Email: dean@topdotenterprises.com

Date: Monday, July 19, 2010

Time: 5:00 PM PDT, 6:00 PM MDT, 7:00 PM CDT, and 8:00 PM EDT
and elsewhere in the world Tuesday 00:00 GMT

More details below:
Continue reading Web Event: Accessible World Tek Talk presents Dean Martineau discussing Speech Recognition, July 19, 2010 →

Event: Hundreds to gather at Nathan Phillips Square on July 20th at the 7th annual disability pride celebration in Toronto

events, signal boost

TORONTO—To mark the 7th annual disability pride celebration in Toronto, Simply People: Celebrating Our Lives & Identities, hundreds will gather at Nathan Phillips Square on July 20th from 5:00PM to 8:00PM. This free outdoor event is open for all to attend (rain or shine).

On stage, there will be several guest speakers, along with performances by singers Joel Martin and Serena Pryne, humorist Libby Thaw, writer Carol Krause and the bands Symphony of Nine and Ordain. There will be a number of display tables setup by organizations/groups to provide information about their products/services.

“Our vision is to bring as many people together to celebrate our lives and identities in an inclusive environment of positive synergies and attitudes of being proud,” says Uzma Khan, a founder of this annual event.

One of this year’s guest speakers will include John Rae, the first Vice-President of the Alliance for Equality of Blind Canadians. He will be discussing the progression of the disability rights movement and his 30+ years of advocacy work.

“Canada’s ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities provides rights holders and their allies a new tool to remove barriers and expand opportunities for all Canadians with disabilities,” says Mr. Rae.

This event is brought to you by Canada-Wide Accessibility for Post-Secondary Students (CANWAPSS) and friends of CANWAPSS, including LinkUp Employment Services, Abilities Arts Festival, VoicePrint, Easter Seals Canada (Access 2 Entertainment), diversityworX and Scadding Court Community Centre.

ASL interpretation, attendant care and transcription services will be available onsite.

For more information about this event, please e-mail the organizers at info@disabilitypride.ca or visit Disability Pride. Join our Facebook group at Simply People – Disability Pride Celebration in Toronto.

Signal Boost: Girls with Disabilities’ Event, Michigan, US

events, signal boost

Girls with Disabilities’ Event
Michigan Disability Rights Coalition
DATE: August 13, 14, 15
LOCATION: Camp Cavell, Lexington, Michigan

Are you a high school girl with a disability between the ages of 14-19?
Would you like to meet other girls with disabilities from across the state of Michigan?

Then you need to register TODAY for Michigan’s girls with disabilities event: Her Power · Her Pride · Her Voice

As a group, we will explore what it means to be a girl teen with a disability, in today’s world.

You will challenge stereotypes and shatter myths about what it means to be a girl with a disability. The media and some adults are continually telling us how us how we are supposed to act, who we are supposed to be, and what we are supposed to look like. It is time for us to CHALLENGE it all.

At this interactive weekend, we will use art-based activities to learn from each other and how to teach the world how we see ourselves. You will find and use the your POWER. You will find your disability PRIDE. You will find your VOICE.

*This event is only open to high school girls with disabilities (any visible and/or invisible) ages 14-19.

For more information, contact the Michigan Disability Rights Coalition.

Announcing: Helen Keller Mythbusting Blogswarm!

activism, disability activism, events, reading list, representations

A banner that has an image of Helen Keller in the center. On on side it reads: Political Activist. Radical Thinker. Suffragist. Pacifist. Journalist. Socialist. Who was she? On the other side it reads: Helen Keller Mythbusting Day 2010
Image Description: A banner that has an image of Helen Keller in the center. On on side it reads: Political Activist. Radical Thinker. Suffragist. Pacifist. Journalist. Socialist. Who was she? On the other side it reads: Helen Keller Mythbusting Day 2010″

I learned that Second Life and Virtual Helping Hands are hosting a Helen Keller Day on Second Life on June 19th.

Helen Keller Day is a day set aside for information acquisition, education, exploration of employment opportunities, social engagement, and enjoyment of arts and entertainment. There will be vendors, employers, presentations, and pure, unbridled fun.

I think this is awesome. If I played Second Life, I would be all over this.

It did get me thinking a lot about Helen Keller, and the way people talk about her and use her legacy – something I’ve discussed on FWD before, in Feminist Icons and Subverting the Narrative.

A few years ago someone on a feminist site posted a list of the top 100 historic women in the US, and the list included Helen Keller. A commenter mentioned being surprised to find that out, because… well, what did Helen Keller actually do?

The answer to that question is what this Blogswam is all about.

What’s a blogswarm?

On the appointed day (or there abouts) – in this case, June 19 – people post about Helen Keller. Ideally, they’ll link back to a master post (which I will be hosting here on FWD) and leave a link indicating their participation on the master post. Then, people will be able to see lots of posts about Helen Keller in a variety of places from a variety of points of view.

Okay, but I don’t know much about Helen Keller. Are there some resources so I can learn?

Yes!

This is just a very short list. Your local library may have many books. I never resist the chance to push Lies My Teacher Told Me by James A Loewen, which talks about Keller in the first chapter. The American Foundation for the Blind has a selected Bibliography of books by and about Keller, but I have not read them so I have no personal opinion on them.

But there are other women with disabilities connected to Helen Keller’s life, and I don’t think they get enough attention either. Can I write about them as well as or instead of Keller and still participate?

Yes! In fact, I think it’s an important part of the mythbusting about Keller to talk about Anne Sullivan, who was blind for parts of her life, Polly Thomson, who was a companion and aid to both Sullivan and Keller in later years, and Laura Bridgman, who was also deaf & blind and was “famous” before Keller. And this list is pretty US-centric, and entirely white. Bust the myth that the only women with disabilities doing anything of interest in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were white women from the US! A very short list: Frida Kahlo, Jhamak Ghimire, Ragnhild Kåta, Theresa Ducharme…

I also think that it’s relevant to talk about Keller’s legacy, and how the treatment of her story – in productions like The Miracle Worker and the oft-repeated story of “the hand in the water” – affect perceptions of people with disabilities, especially blind and d/Deaf people, today. Brownfemipower linked to this discussion of Blind Rage and the Legacy of Helen Keller on TheGimpParade, as an example.

I’m really not up to participating, but I want to be supportive. What can I do?

Spread the word! Tell a friend! Read posts! Link others to posts! Bust your own myths, so that the next time someone says something ignorant about Keller or the work she did, you can gently (or not!) correct them.

I want to participate! But I don’t know if I can on June 19th.

Then write something on another day. The reason I suggest doing it all on the same day is because blogswarms will push across the blogosphere and people will notice them all at once. But please don’t feel obligated or that you’ve “failed” if you don’t write something about Mythbusting on the day.

Also, don’t feel you have to write something new. If you’ve previously written something about this and would like it to get some more attention, feel free to link it as well.

So, now what?

Well, on June 19th I’ll post up an open post about Helen Keller Mythbusting Day here on FWD. Folks can drop their links in right away – my goal is to have it open as early on the 19th as possible. Check back throughout the day to see what posts people have written!

I hope to see lots of awesome posts on June 19th!

BADD: How can I support Blogging Against Disablism Day?

activism, events, identity, intersectionality, language, recommended reading, social attitudes, , ,

Blogging Against Disablism Day, May 1st 2010Today is the “beginning” of Blogging Against Disablism Day 2010. I put beginning in quotes there not just because the day is done in Australia and the West Coast of Canada is still waking up, but because Diary of a Goldfish, who hosts BADD every year, acknowledges that people with disabilities are not necessarily able to post precisely on the date of a blog swarm – that there is inherent disablism in demanding that disabled people write a post on a specific time table.

Every year since I started participating in BADD, I’ve had many people ask me how they – both as currently non-disabled people, and as people with disabilities – can best participate in BADD if they don’t want to, or can’t, write a post, put up a photo, or create a video or podcast. Here is just a short list of suggestions:

Check out the ever-growing list of BADD posts over at Diary of a Goldfish. Even “just” (there’s no just about your time/energy investment!) reading people’s posts and learning about their experiences contributes a lot to BADD. Blogswarms like this are all about raising awareness, and raising your own awareness is just as important. As well, you may find a whole new set of blogs to add to your blog-reading lists. There are so many bloggers with disabilities out there, fighting the good fight against ableism every day.

Comment on some BADD posts. I know that every time I write something and it gets no comments, I feel like I’ve put effort out for nothing. [This is not a demand for more comments for me! I’m just sayin’.] If you have the time/energy to do so, I would really encourage you to leave comments in support of BADD posts. They don’t have to be lengthy: even just “This post was great, thank you for writing it” can make a difference. If you’re up to writing more, go for it! But just leaving words of support can be a big deal.

Tell people about the awesome posts you’ve read. If you have a blog, link your favourite BADD posts so others can check them out – if not today, then over the next few days, or even weeks. Months. They’re not going anywhere, and although we all hope the prejudices against people with disabilities are going to disappear, that’s probably not going anywhere anytime soon, either. There’s nothing saying you have to only link to BADD posts this week. If you’ve got a twitter account, tweet some links to your followers! The hash-tag for BADD seems to be #badd, but I like to also tag my tweets #disability as well. (This is selfish on my part – I follow the #disability tags on twitter.)

Think about dis/ableism in your every-day life. This one is mostly for the non-disabled people, or for people like me – I always need to remind myself to think outside my box of “what disability looks like”. There are huge swaths of my workplace that someone in a wheelchair can’t get in, and I went to a university last week that claimed it was impossible to put floor announcements in their elevators. Many [not all – I’ve heard very good things about some places, like L’Arche] of the group homes in Canada for people with cognitive impairments are more like prisons than the “home-like” environment they claim to be. The websites for each of the major political parties in Canada are inaccessible to many people with disabilities, and events that are held for “all Canadians” have no captioning, no visual description, and no way for Sign users to participate.

I think BADD is a great opportunity to see just how much is out there about disability on the internet. For disabled people who may be feeling isolated, it’s a great time to see just how many people are out there that struggle with similar issues. For the non-disabled, it’s a great way to start educating yourself about disability issues.

The Blogging Against Disablism 2010 Page will update throughout the day. Here’s just a tiny selection of posts that I’ve had the chance to read, and highly recommend.