Crip News v.3
Hi, new subscribers! We're 3 weeks old today. 🐣 Thanks for being here.
It will be a pressure cooker of a week for the ongoing negotiations over the Biden administration’s major domestic policy and infrastructure bills. We are waiting for precise details, but it appears there will be significant support for home and community-based services, as well as expansion of Medicaid and Medicare.
The approach to pass these bills is complex and requires broad support, but this may be the week these bills pass. In the coming issues, look for more analysis about how these policies will affect disability communities.
The Ford Foundation recently announced its first-ever Disability Rights Program with an annual budget of $10 million. While Foundation’s Creativity and Free Expression Program has made disability arts funding part of its work, including support for the Disability Futures Fellowships, it has never had a stand-alone program focused on disability.
This is complicated news for activists who have not forgotten Ford’s funding of the Homes for Life Foundation’s dangerous co-optation of community-based services to legitimate coercive living conditions for disabled adults in Delaware. And those who opposed Ford President Darren Walker’s support for the creation of new jails in NYC. And those who are concerned, generally, about the capacity for American philanthropy to lead meaningful justice movement work.
In the coming issues, look for more analysis about these developments.
In other news:
Last week, the Craig H. Neilsen Foundation announced 3 recipients of its 2021 Visionary Prize. And the disabled dancer, choreographer, and founder of Kinetic Light, Alice Sheppard, was among them! Alice will direct 100% of the $1 million prize to directly supporting other disabled artists.
Visual AIDS and the Studio Museum have released the Last Address Tribute Walk: Harlem, “a digital resource page featuring an interactive map of key AIDS-related sites in Harlem, excerpts from our oral history project, archival materials, and sources for additional research and exploration.”
On the Collegeland Podcast, Aimi Hamraie, Jonathan Sterne, and Bess Williamson discuss the failing accommodations systems that have put financial considerations over the safety of faculty and students. Also check out the “Beyond High Risk” letter from 2020.
The Disabled Student Union at UCLA recently protested the university’s lack of remote access. The action, on campus and on Zoom, came after university officials stonewalled the student activists’ work in a previous meeting.
Across the U.S., a bus driver shortage is disproportionately affecting disabled students.
Last week, AstroAccess Flight One carried 12 disabled people on a parabolic flight over Southern California to simulate zero gravity conditions. AstroAccess aims to make space flight disability-inclusive.
Last week, CNN’s John King disclosed on air that he is immunocompromised, expressing gratitude for the network’s vaccine mandate for all employees.
Lauren Ridloff talks about being a Deaf superhero in the next Marvel movie, The Eternals, directed by Chloé Zhao to be released on Nov. 5.
Chella Man’s short film The Beauty of Being Deaf screened as part of NYC’s NewFest last week.
The annual juried exhibition at Southern Exposures in San Francisco features 16 disabled artists in the Bay Area. Interconnected is curated by Jackie Clay and Jillian Crochet and will be up until Nov. 20.
In Art in America, Anne Boyer reflects on the work of Hannah Wilke on the occasion of Wilke’s retrospective at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in St. Louis.
Videos from the packed schedule of the Dismantling Eugenics convening from late Sept. are now available.
On Literary Hub, Louise Fein writes “On the Historical Stigmatization and Persistent Vilification of Epilepsy in Literature.”
MySoundDelve, a “player-centric fantasy & sci-fi mobile sound effect app,” released a soundset featuring all disabled voice actors with phrases like “I am not your inspiration” and “Walking is overrated.”
Baltimore-based MOMCares is accepting applications for a Full Spectrum Doula Training Program with Ana Rodney from Dec. 2-5, 2021. It’s free! Applications are due Nov. 1.
Applications for AAPD’s Paul G. Hearne Emerging Leader Awards are due on Wednesday, Oct. 27.
The Disability & Philanthropy Forum is hiring a Program & Communications Associate.
Welcome, readers! Lots of you have subscribed to this newsletter in the last week, so I wanted to invite you - no pressure! - to reply here to let me know how you learned about this project, what kind of stuff would be most helpful to read about each week, or just say hi!
Now, this week’s events!
The 2021 Rudin Lecture at Marymount Manhattan College is called “Disability Arts Is.” by Simi Linton and Alice Sheppard, moderated by Therí Pickens on Wednesday, Oct. 27 from 6-7:30pm ET on Zoom. ASL and CART, with other access features by request. No cost.
The Health Justice Commons invites movement building partners to a special session on “Intersex Justice and Decolonizing Medicine” in their current course, Understanding and Transforming the Medical Industrial Complex, Part One. Rupa Marya and Raj Patel, authors of Inflamed: Deep Medicine and the Anatomy of Injustice, will join the session on Thursday, Oct. 28 from 8-10pm ET on Zoom. ASL, CART, and English-Spanish translation. No cost. If you are interested, please reply to me here ASAP.
People’s Hub’s Community Care Clinic for Disabled & Chronically Ill Movement Folks is happening tonight, Oct. 25 from 7-9pm ET on Zoom. ASL and automated captions, with other access requests to dustin@peopleshub.org. No cost or by donation. Registration here.
The Patricia & Philip Frost Museum at Florida International University hosts a conversation with disabled photographer Robert Andy Coombs on Wednesday, Oct. 27 from 12-1pm ET on Zoom. No access information. No cost.
If you’re interested in finding community with other people using and producing audio description, sign up for VocalEye’s monthly Describer Café. The next one is this Friday, Oct. 29 (and every last Friday of the month). No access information. No cost.
Slow Factory presents “Sustainable Organizing for Sustainable Movements” with Candice Fortin as part of their Open Education series on Oct. 29 at 12pm ET on Zoom. Registration here. No access info. Donations encouraged.
Turtle Disco, a somatic writing studio, is hosting two events on Zoom this week: Crip Magic Reading/Writing Workshop with Stephanie Heit & Petra Kuppers on Thursday, Oct. 28 from 7-8:15pm ET. And Zoomshell Connection with Turtle Disco Kaffeeklatsch on Friday, Oct. 29 from 7-8pm ET. Registration info here. Access features by request. No cost or by donation.
An embedded Instagram post from @aslslam shows a flyer for a Spooky Slam with Zavier on Friday, Oct. 29 in person at the Nuyorican Poets Cafe in NYC. Social hour 6-7pm. Show 7-8:30pm.
The NYC Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities, Disability Unite, and Art Beyond Sight are hosting “America’s Recovery: Powered by Inclusion - An Intergenerational Training and Mentorship Experience” on Tuesday, Oct. 26 from 10am to 2pm ET on Zoom. Access features by registration survey. No cost.
I hope this week brings you many good naps.
Kevin, we've needed this! so helpful.