Movements: Politics, Performance, and Disability

Movements: Politics, Performance, and Disability

The Scholar & Feminist Conference XXXVI

Barnard College

Saturday, 2/26 (9-5pm)

This year's Scholar & Feminist conference brings together feminism and disability studies, two fields that have contributed to the interrogation of the public/private divide, and when brought together, radically contest and amplify the ways in which this split has produced extremely thin understandings and practices of accessibility, participation, livelihood, visibility and integration. Movements: Politics, Performance, and Disability will look closely at the ways in which political action and cultural production contribute to new ways of imagining what an inclusive society might look like for all. Through dance, film, political engagement and dialogue, we will make our way from Barnard College to New York City to the larger world and back again, exploring the ways in which artistic endeavors, scholarship, and politics have all led to mobilizations for feminist and disability activism. The conference features a series of workshops on topics including parenting and disability, alternatives to creating community in the face of privitization and state budget cuts, films on disability, and a new project on oral histories with Barnard and Columbia alumnae who identify as disabled. The day concludes with a special performance by the Heidi Latsky Dance Company, a fully integrated dance group.

Panelists include Nirmala Erevelles, Carrie Sandahl, Susan Schweik, Alice Sheppard, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Rachel Adams, Pam Cobrin, Faye Ginsburg, Ansel Lurio, Kate Schaub, Penny Wolfson, Mary Marshall Clark, Ynestra King, Julie Maury, Stacey Milbern, and Akemi Nishida. ReelAbilities Film Festival will present a series of groundbreaking short films made by and about different deaf communities from around the world.

A conference website and online registration will be available online in late January. Please join our email list or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.