Experiences of Disability I: Aging in the Community
Friday, March 22, 2024
10:30 AM – 12:00 PM
- Palmer House Hilton – Kimball Room – Third Floor
Organizers
- Rosamund OatesManchester Metropolitan University
- Zuleika MuratUniversità degli Studi di Padova
Chair
- Marie-Louise LeonardUniversità Ca’ Foscari Venezia
Presentations
Experiences of Disability II: Confraternities and Social Lives
Friday, March 22, 2024
1:30 PM – 3:00 PM
- Palmer House Hilton – Kimball Room – Third Floor
Organizers
- Rosamund OatesManchester Metropolitan University
- Zuleika MuratUniversità degli Studi di Padova
Chair
- Zuleika MuratUniversità degli Studi di Padova
Presentations
Experiences of Disability III: Artists and Artistry
Friday, March 22, 2024
3:30 PM – 5:00 PM
- Palmer House Hilton – Kimball Room – Third Floor
Organizers
- Zuleika MuratUniversità degli Studi di Padova
- Rosamund OatesManchester Metropolitan University
Chair
- Rosamund OatesManchester Metropolitan University
Panel Respondent
- Rosamund OatesManchester Metropolitan University
Presentations
The Borderlands of Disability
Friday, March 22, 2024
8:30 AM – 10:00 AM
- Palmer House Hilton – Red Lacquer Room – Fourth Floor
Description
Since its inception in the late twentieth century, Disability Studies has encouraged scholars to reevaluate the categories and methods we use to understand human bodies and minds. The term disability is itself an elusive category, situated on an “ever-changing, ever-slippery spectrum” (Nielsen 2014). The “rich borderland” (Kudlick 2013) around disability’s blurred edges is an especially productive site of inquiry for understanding how disability is defined and experienced in different contexts. In this roundtable, four historians discuss their work at the fluid fault lines of disability, not only in terms of cross-disciplinary methods but also temporal and geographic boundaries:
- Working at the intersection of disability history, the history of medicine and technology, and mechanical engineering, Heidi Hausse discusses a collaborative effort to investigate an early modern mechanical hand from Germany through a 3D-printed prototype and lab-based experiments.
- At the borderlands between disability history and the history of emotions, Wayne Tan presents his work on early modern blindness and patient accounts of Hansen’s disease in modern Japan. He discusses how we can move between different historical and literary contexts and temporal frames.
- At the border between medical history and disability history, Jacob Baum explores the conceptual and methodological tools that early modern medical history offers to scholars of disability. His research on a deaf German shoemaker’s autobiography reveals how the experience of hearing loss and deafness was shaped by a diverse and far-flung network of healers, from formally trained physicians to mysterious cunning folk, who nonetheless shared a set of common assumptions about health and the human body.
- Ashley Elrod discusses how disability history and cultural studies bring new insights to the history of psychiatry by showing how early modern litigants used the German court system to challenge legal and medical understandings of mental incompetence
Organizer
- Ashley ElrodNortheastern Illinois University
Chair
- Rochelle RojasKalamazoo College
Roundtable Discussants
- Jacob M. BaumTexas Tech University
- Heidi HausseAuburn University
- Wei Yu Wayne TanHope College
- Ashley ElrodNortheastern Illinois University
The Biopolitics of Disability in Renaissance Europe
Saturday, March 23, 2024
9:00 AM – 10:30 AM
- Palmer House Hilton – Salon 12 – Third Floor
Sponsor Organization
Organizers
- Michelle M. DowdUniversity of Alabama
- Ari FriedlanderUniversity of Mississippi
Chair
- Sawyer K KempQueens College, CUNY
Presentations
Milton and Disability
Saturday, March 23, 2024
11:00 AM – 12:30 PM
- Palmer House Hilton – LaSalle 5 – Seventh Floor
Sponsor Organization
Organizer
- Eric B. SongSwarthmore College
Chair
- Erin MurphyBoston University
Presentations
Race and Disability in Cavendish Studies
Saturday, March 23, 2024
4:30 PM – 6:00 PM
- Palmer House Hilton – Sandburg 6 – Seventh Floor
Sponsor Organization
Organizer
- Lara A. DoddsMississippi State University
Chair
- Sujata IyengarUniversity of Georgia