Crip News v.65
Crip News v.65
If your mail client cuts off today's issue, view the entire message for all the rad stuff in here. MLK & guaranteed income, dispatches on COVID & education, and more.
hello to students at the dawn of a new semester. hello to those who found this project after a gracious shout-out from alice wong last week. (love you, alice!) hello to readers who’ve been here for a while. hello to readers who might only have the bandwidth for a deep read once in a while.
hello, fabulous people. thanks for being here.
-kevin
MLK, Guaranteed Income, and Disability
In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, I started reflecting on a specific part of MLK’s legacy: his lesser-known call for guaranteed income (GI) - and how it relates to contemporary disability politics.
It ballooned into its own post, so check it out here.
NEWS
COVID Dispatch
Each week, it gets stranger to gather news about COVID. There is a bewildering and enraging gap between public cultures that erase the pandemic’s effects and those effects’ direct threat to the lives of disabled and immunocompromised people.
On one side of things is a growing casualization. Not just in policy arenas (e.g., when the Department of Health and Human Services stops paying for COVID treatments and Paxlovid hits the private market later this year, its cost will soar), but also in publishing: The New York Times recently announced it is ending its Virus Briefing newsletter “as more of us are trying to pick up the pieces and move on.” Institutions that we should trust to maintain their rigorous focus are instead taking dangerous risks, like when an article published in The New Republic that suggested long COVID is a psychosocial response to the trauma of the pandemic itself (“a software problem, not a hardware problem”) prompted a public correction from over 200 experts.
But on the other side are those refusing to “move on.” We can celebrate our researchers, like those who just published a major review of findings, mechanisms, and recommendations about long COVID in Nature Reviews Microbiology. We can support our patient-led organizers, like #MEAction, who are expanding access to effective care. And we can remain practiced in our vigilance, like spreading the word about The People’s CDC’s new guide on “What to do if you have COVID.”
Education Dispatch
Educators with disability expertise are sounding the alarm on a coming “tidal wave” of unnecessary special education referrals that reflect systemic failures to address pandemic trauma and threaten disabled students’ access to support they need.
This may explain new research that challenges the long-held assumption that integrating disabled students into general education classrooms yields better outcomes, codified in disability legislation like the IDEA. The meta-analysis, however, is quite limited by major methodological challenges across studies, itself an indication that more and better research is sorely needed.
It’s not yet clear how the $904 million boost in funding for special education that went into the recent congressional spending bill will intervene.
In higher education, disabled students and workers are being left behind. Heather Ringo and Julia Métraux write about the gutting of the Access Needs Article during the UC strike. And faculty members Beth Ribet and Juliann Anesi write about how these exclusions are playing out at UCLA.
In Other News…
The $1.7 trillion U.S. federal spending bill includes several long-sought wins for disability organizers: it expands the eligibility for access to ABLE accounts (from disability onset before 26 to 46, starting in 2026), it extends Medicaid’s Money Follows the Person program to 2027, and it opens the door to an FDA ban on the torture known as “electrical stimulation devices.”
Over 7,000 nurses at Mount Sinai Medical Center and Montefiore in New York participated in a strike over working conditions, chronic understaffing, and patient care. They won measurable, enforceable procedures for safer staffing in their new contracts.
Housing Works is drawing attention to NY Gov. Kathy Hochul’s budget cuts that leave community healthcare in the dust.
Olivia Raynor, Founder/Director of the UCLA National Arts and Disability Center, was appointed to the California Arts Council.
New Works
ABC News (Australia) recently featured the movement practice, pedagogy, and collaborations of disabled artist Leisa Prowd.
Georgia-based disabled artist Abigail “Lace” Wise recently spoke about the connection between shapeshifting and disability in her makeup artistry on a local news human interest segment.
The Blackwood Gallery’s 14th issue of The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge features work by Jeffrey Ansloos, Sarah Bird, Matthew Bonn, Brothers Sick, Emily Cadotte, Lynn Crosbie, Rayne Foy-Vachon, Karl Gardner, Craig Jennex, Shan Kelley, Mya Moniz, Kayla Moryoussef, Mourning School, Rasheen Oliver, Tamara Oyola-Santiago, Kimone Rodney, Fady Shanouda, nancy viva davis halifax, Chrystal Waban Toop, What Would an HIV Doula Do?, and Karen K. Yoshida.
“A Dialogue and Reflection about the Masks for Crips Project” by Alison Kopit and Chun-shan (Sandie) Yi is out in Lateral.
Rest in Power, Deaf Immy
Brighton-based Imogen Nunn attracted hundreds of thousands of followers on social media creating content about Deaf culture and mental health. Her TikTok account is an archive of queer joy and humor. The Limping Chicken has compiled tributes from her mum and partner and notes: “If you or someone you know is in need of mental health support, help and information is available via the Deaf health charity SignHealth. If you require urgent support, text DEAF to 85258 to contact the Shout crisis text line.”
CALLS
The British Council has commissioned a follow-up study to the 2021 report “Time to Act: How lack of knowledge in the cultural sector creates barriers for disabled artists and audiences.” Europe-based cultural professionals involved in performing arts venues or festivals (e.g. as artistic directors, programmers, curators, general managers, chief executives, creative producers, cultural managers, etc.) are invited to take a new 10-15 minute survey, also available in French, Italian, Swedish, Polish and Spanish.
The Joan Mitchell Foundation is seeking applications for a full-time Director of Artist Programs role. Deadline is Jan. 17th.
AAPD is hiring a REV UP Coalition Coordinator and an Events and Logistics Coordinator. Applications are due Friday, Jan. 20th.
The City of Hobart, Australia is seeking artists to mentor and co-create work for the 2023 Ability to Create festival. Deadline is Feb. 6th.
EVENTS
The Disability, Debility, and Form Working Group Spring Visiting Artist and Lecturer Series
Monday, Jan 23rd from 3 - 4pm ET with Kalindi Vara
All 5 events will be on Zoom with ASL and automated captions. For more information, please email maeesk@design.upenn.edu.
Disabled Artists Showcase: Creating Our Spaces
Saturday, Jan. 21st, 6:30pm PT on YouTube
Dark Room Ballet Introductory Classes for Blind and Visually Impaired Adults
New cycle begins Saturday, January 21st from 4 – 5:30pm ET