Chicago Disability Studies Conference – Doing Disability Studies: Cripping Community, Culture, and Collaboration

Disability Studies has radical potential to revolutionize other fields of study. Disability Studies has brought into question foundational narratives of modern societies and has forced us to rethink how we conceive of ourselves, our bodies, communities, and nations. It has challenged academic communities to turn their attention to the accessibility of classrooms as well as the built environment on campuses. It has encouraged activists to reconsider what intersectionality can look like in practice and broadened conceptions of access. And it has prompted professional communities, such as medical experts and social workers, to profoundly transform practice by redefining notions of care.

This conference encourages deeper conversations between academic and non-academic spaces, university administration, social work, medical professional fields, and activism, to promote the valuable connections between theory and practice in all of those spaces.

The Chicagoland Disability Studies Conference asks:
What does doing disability studies mean?
How does disability studies interact with the concepts of community, culture, and collaboration?

Keynote Speakers:
Emerging Chicagoland Disability Scholars speaking on the future of disability research and scholarship

Organized by:
UIC Disability and Human Development Student Association

Where: Remotely
We are working on logistics to host the event through an online platform

Who should attend? The event is open to the public and we encourage all those interested in disability studies to attend

The Chicago Disability Studies Conference started a few years ago, as an informal conference to provide a practice space for students with disabilities to share their work. Since then, the conference has only grown, but its heart remains the same: A student-run space to provide graduate students, undergraduate students, and other community members a safe, accessible, non-judgmental space for gaining experience in presenting their work.

The continued goal of the CDSC is to promote collaboration among students doing disability studies work and foster an academic identity for disability studies in Chicagoland. The conference accomplishes these goals through: creating a space for disability studies students to present work before taking research outside of the area, providing an opportunity for collaboration and networking among disability studies scholars, and by providing value-added workshops.

IMPORTANT NOTE: For those registering after the March 27th registration deadline, we may have limitations within the online platform.  We have been humbled by overwhelming response thus far. We hope that you will still register if you are interested, but with that caveat in mind.  We will do our best to make space and meet needs where possible.

Access considerations that will be provided, include but are not limited to, live captioning during the online presentations and accessible presentation materials made available.

For more information, contact the conference team at: disabilitystudiesconfchicago@gmail.com