Call for papers: Representing Disability and Emotion

From: Elizabeth Donaldson (via Penny Richards)

Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies
CFP Representing Disability and Emotion
Guest Edited by Catherine Prendergast and Elizabeth J. Donaldson

Several fields in the humanities including literary studies have
recently turned their attention to emotion, reconsidering its
traditional figuration as interior, private, and apolitical. This
work asks us to consider instead how emotions and affective
expressions are constructed, valued, performed, and regulated.

JLCDS encourages submissions that will put this burgeoning work on
emotion and affect into conversation with disability studies for a
special issue on Disability and Emotion. How does this new work on
emotion and affect take up or leave out disability in considering
pain, the body, and the psyche? How do certain emotional states or
affects become construed as impairments? How has disability been
emotionally configured in literary texts?

We especially encourage work that will examine and interrogate the
emotional politics of disability studies itself. Disability studies
has been founded on a moment of emotional reformation: The clarion
call of "No Pity" sought to arrest an emotional response and its
attendant politics. How has that clarion call both launched and
regulated the study of emotion in disability studies?

Proposals should be e-mailed to the guest editors Catherine
Prendergast (http://webmail.rochester.rr.com/do/mail/message/mailto?to=cprender%40uiuc.edu)
and Elizabeth Donaldson
(http://webmail.rochester.rr.com/do/mail/message/mailto?to=edonalds%40nyit.edu) before 1 May 2009.

The final typescripts will be due before 1 November 2009.

Further information is available on the JLCDS website.
http://webmail.rochester.rr.com/do/redirect?url=http%253A%252F%252Fwww.jlcds.org
http://webmail.rochester.rr.com/do/mail/message/mailto?to=subscriptions%40marston.co.uk

Also available through Project MUSE

28-year-old disabled woman's death is under investigation

Camden, New Jersey - Prosecutors and the state Department of Human Services are investigating the death on November 10, 2008, of 28 year-old Tara O’Leary, who lived in a New Jersey-licensed community care residence for adults with developmental disabilities in Hunterdon County in central New Jersey. As reported by the Associated Press and the Star Ledger, Ms O'Leary was born with scoliosis, fluid on her brain and cerebral palsy. She moved into the Bloomsbury home in 1998. According to her cousin, Eileen Devlin, medical records showed that O’Leary, (who was 4′10″) weighed 95 pounds at a doctor’s visit in September 2007. In August 2008, however, when an aunt, Patricia O’Leary, saw her, she was “gaunt, with unwashed hair and shoes on the wrong feet.” O’Leary had not had a guardian since the death of her father in 2005 and her aunt asked to be her legal guardian.

Once she was taken from the home, Tara O’Leary lived in an institution for a little over a week before she was taken to Hunterdon Medical Center suffering from dehydration, malnutrition and bedsores and septic shock, Devlin said. She weighed just 48 pounds at check-in.

Devlin said that with a feeding tube, her cousin’s weight rose to more than 70 pounds by November, but her overall medical condition did not improve. She died Nov. 10, days after she, Patricia O’Leary and another cousin became her legal guardians and decided to take her off life support.

Two other women who lived in the home, one of whom had also lost a dangerous amount of weight, were also removed. There were reportedly not ill or injured.

According to Ms O'Leary's relatives, attempts by family members to visit her were "hindered" by the state:

Relatives said that after Tara O'Leary's father died, they were able to visit her sporadically. They said they were never allowed to see her in the home where she was living - over even to know exactly where it was.

Ms O'Leary's caseworker has been suspended and the home's license has been revoked. In addition, state workers will visit 620 similar state-funded and licensed residences to ensure the well-being of the 1,255 residents living in them. Jennifer Velez, commissioner of the Department of Human Services, made this statement:

“This death is unacceptable on many levels, and we’re doing all we can to scrutinize every aspect and prevent tragedies such as this from occurring again.”

Yes, unacceptable. I wonder why a guardian wasn't appointed after the death of Ms O'Leary's father three years ago.

Things to read #3

This story from ABC in Los Angeles - Larae Ransom, a 25 year old woman with paraplegia, claims that a Greyhound bus driver repeatedly refused to lower the bus lift to allow her to use a restroom for six hours on a trip to Las Vegas. Another witness appears on a news tape supporting the fact that the driver failed to lower the lift for Ms Ransom. H/t to Ruth over at Wheelchair Catholic.

Dear ADA generation - Ms Crip Chick considers arguments both in support of and against Micah Fialka-Feldman's fight to live on his university's campus in the context of the ada generation and disability activism/solidarity.

Woman in wheelchair sued after being hit by a truck - it's reported that the woman, who was hit by a landscaper's pick-up truck while crossing an intersection, is being sued for damages to the truck.

Mother wants to limit voting for people with developmental disabilities - the woman, who unsuccessfully challenged her son's ballot, wants to change the law so people with developmental disabilities can't vote with supervision.

A British teen has won the right to refuse a heart transplant - via the BBC.

Recent cases of sexual abuse against women with disabilities

Below are some of the cases of sexual abuse against women with disabilities that have been reported in the media since my post on November 12. All of these women are younger than 20-years-old, and all have developmental disabilities. One also has cerebral palsy. Three of the male assailants are older than fifty. The other is fourteen years old. One man has a long criminal record and has also been convicted of murdering his first wife - he is also a suspect in the disappearance of his second wife. One man was a landlord to one of the women and one was a family member.

Michigan, Detroit - WLNS reported on the sentencing to 10-17 years in prison last Tuesday of a 60-year-old Brownstown Township man, Roger Sweet, in connection with the sexual assault of a 19-year-old woman with developmental disabilities. His sentencing follows a prison sentence earlier this month on charges that he used the young woman to produce pornography. In addition, Sweet has also been convicted of the second-degree murder of his first wife, Mariene Sweet, for which he will be sentenced on November 25. According to this report, he is also suspected in the disappearance of his second wife, Lizzie Mae Collier-Sweet.

Farmington, New Mexico - The Daily Times reports that a landlord accused of sexual abusing a 16-year-old girl with developmental disabilities while he was visiting her when she was alone was sentenced on November 17 to 18-months in prison.

Lehigh Acres, Florida - News Press reported the arrest of a 14-year-old Lee County teenager in connection with alleged sexual assault of a 12-year-old girl with cerebral palsy and developmental disabilities.

Rochester, New York - An Ogden man charged with 17 counts including rape, sex abuse and endangering the welfare of a 16-year-old girl with developmental disabilities took a plea deal early yesterday afternoon (November 24), according to WHEC. Joseph Brandt plead guilty to a violent felony of criminal sex act and will spend four years in state prison. Brandt, who is a relative of the girl, will be sentenced in February.

Murder sentence

Denver, Colorado - 48-year-old Gerald Cooper was sentenced to 48 years in prison yesterday in the July 2005 beating and stabbing death of Carol Colaiano, who was disabled, in her downtown apartment. As reported in yesterday's Rocky Mountain News:

Denver police discovered the victim dead in her apartment in the 1200 block of Galapago Street after an aide found her and called for help.

Seven months later, detectives investigated another attack in the same apartment building. The victim, who was sexually assaulted, survived the attack and later identified Cooper, who lived in the building, as her assailant.

Cooper pleaded guilty to assault in that case and was sentenced to prison, where he was required to provide a DNA sample for the national Combined DNA Index System.

With Cooper's DNA in their possession, authorities were able to match his DNA with a blood mixture that he left behind at Colaiano's apartment, as well a blood mixture belonging to the victim, prosecutors said.

More children with Down's syndrome are being born in the UK

according to this report in yesterday's Times Online. It notes that whilst a majority of women who receive a prenatal diagnosis of Down’s Syndrome choose not to have the child, “many are now deciding to give birth.”

Religious beliefs or strong opposition to abortion account for about a third of such decisions, a survey of Down’s Syndrome Association members has found.

About the same number of parents went ahead because they felt that the life chances of Down’s children were better than before, and attitudes towards them had improved. Life expectancy for people with Down’s has risen to about 60. Children have been integrated widely into mainstream schools, and many adults are now in work.

A quarter of respondents said that they had been swayed because they knew people with Down’s or other disabilities. Most also said that they could count on family and friends for support.

Full story here ....

Woman living in backyard shed

Redwood City, California - When San Mateo County Sheriff's deputies responded to a family disturbance last week, they found a 58-year-old woman, “Amelia,” who has developmental disabilities, living in a shed in the back yard, because, she told police, there was no room for her inside the home which housed her brother, her sister, and seven pitbull terriers. As reported by KARE 11 TV:

San Mateo County authorities say there were no signs of abuse or starvation, or that the woman was being held against her will.

What troubles them the most is how the 58-year-old woman named "Amelia" lived compared to her brother and sister who lived in the home in front of her shed.

They have running water. They don’t sit on a tiny little, almost child’s commode to do their personal needs. They have electricity and real heat, not a space heater on a frayed wire,” said Steve Wagstaffe of the San Mateo District Attorney’s Office.

Sheriff’s deputies arrested Amelia’s sister and brother for grand theft on charges they used her $700 per month Social Security check on themselves instead for her.

State run agency settles sexual assault lawsuit


From the Associated Press

SPARTANBURG, SC (AP) - A state-run center for the mentally disabled in Spartanburg has agreed to pay a former resident $300,000 after he was sexually assaulted by a facility employee.

The Herald-Journal of Spartanburg reports the settlement between the Whitten Center and the unidentified 22-year-old victim was approved Thursday. It is the most a state-run facility can pay to settle a lawsuit.

The victim's attorney says the Disabilities and Special Needs Department was negligent in hiring and training Daniel Maxwell Bradley.

An agency spokeswoman says Bradley's hiring process was rigorous and included an interview, a State Law Enforcement Division criminal background check and a drug screening.

Bradley was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 2006 after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting three Whitten residents.

Murder indictment

Lebanon, Indianna - Elizabeth A. Fairfield, 38, was indicted on Friday for the alleged murder of her 14-year-old daughter, Brittany, who had Down syndrome and died last year from a drug overdose. The manner of Brittany's death, according to the Indy Star, is yet to be determined. A grand jury deliberated for more than three hours before handing down the murder indictment. Ms. Fairfield is being held without bail in the Boone County Jail and faces up to 65 years in prison if convicted.

Just sadness

The Wisconsin State Journal reported yesterday about the shooting death on Tuesday of 12-year-old Kyle Dutter by his father, Ryan Dutter, who then shot and killed himself. In August, Ryan Dutter created a website about his son, in which he updated family and friends about him. It is reported that last fall, Ryan Rutter had filed for bankruptcy. Kyle, who had developmental disabilities, is described as a good kid trying really hard. He was in the the sixth grade at Glacier Creek Middle School in Cross Plains, Wisconsin.

h/t to Autism Vox

Call for Abstracts

*** Embodied Resistance: Breaking the Rules in Public Spaces ***

Co-Editors, Chris Bobel, University of Massachusetts Boston and Samantha Kwan, University of Houston

This edited collection will assemble scholarly yet accessibly written works that explore the dimensions of resistance to embodied taboos of all sorts. We are interested in pieces that describe and analyze the many ways that humans subvert the social constraints that deem certain behaviors and bodily presentations as inappropriate, disgusting, private and/or forbidden in various cultural and historical contexts. Empirical, historical, theoretical and narrative contributions are equally welcome.

This book, intended as a supplemental text for use in undergraduate and graduate classrooms, aims to advance and deepen our understanding of the motivations, experiences and consequences associated with the bodies that break the rules through the (intersecting) lenses of gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, culture, religiosity, disability, class and nation.

The editors welcome submissions from scholars in a range of disciplines, including but not limited to sociology, women's and gender studies, anthropology, science studies, cultural studies, literary studies, disability studies, psychology, and history. We especially encourage scholarship which focuses on areas outside the US and the West.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to, practices that challenge:

- Traditional attire norms, e.g., older women who do not "dress their age," fat women who "show skin," and parents who refuse to dress their children in traditional gender attire

- Conventional hair and body norms, e.g., women who conspicuously do not shave, youth who experiment with hair colors and cuts, and individuals with numerous and various forms of body art

- The binary construction of gender, e.g., various practices and performances by individuals who identify as transgender, queer, ormetrosexual=20

- Biological processes considered contextually taboo, e.g., mothers who conspicuously breastfeed in public and women who do not hide the fact of their menstruation

- Physical conditions that carry stigma, e.g., cancer patients who do not conceal their hair loss, HIV positive people who speak openly about their HIV status, and intersex individuals who publicly discuss their condition

- Cultural, religious, and/or ethnic norms, e.g., Muslim womenwho wear hijab in spite of policies or laws that forbid veiling and Falun Gong practitioners who meditate in public demonstrations

SUBMISSION PROCEDURE: We invite authors to submit an abstract on or before December 19, 2008. Submissions should take the form of a 250-500 word abstract outlining the intent and scope of the paper, and where appropriate, author's theoretical, empirical, and/or methodological framework. Authors will be notified by February 13, 2009 about the status of their proposal. Full papers are expected by May 29, 2009.

Please direct inquiries and submissions to BOTH editors:

Chris Bobel chris.bobel@umb.edu
Samantha Kwan sskwan@uh.edu

Transgender day of remembrance, 2008

additional links:

Ten years, 400 dead, and counting (Transgriot)

Not just a name on a list (The Bilerico Project)

For Teish Cannon (Crip Chick)

Memorializing 2008 (Transgenderor.org)

Transgender day of remembrance (Deb Crow's Journal)

Today is Transgender Day of Remembrance to "memorialize those who were killed due to anti-transgender hatred or prejudice." The event is held in November to honor Rita Hester, whose murder on November 28th, 1998 spawned the "Remembering Our Dead" online project and candlelight vigil. Of course, there are many interconnections between queer, transgendered, gendered, raced and disabled bodies: to read an earlier post by Shiva at Biodiverse Resistance about why an alliance between the transgender rights movement and disability rights movement is necessary, see here. And here is a link to a FORGE Forward keynote speech that Eli Claire gave about the intersections of trans, queer and disability identities and politics.

Below are links to some Transgender Day of Remembrance 2008 posts I've read this morning:

Transgender day of remembrance 2008 events and locations (Transgenderdor.org)

How to mourn (Lisa, Questioning Transphobia. Cross posted at Sexual ambiguities)

Transgender day of remembrance 2008 (Bird of paradox)

The value of a life (Dented blue mercedes)

Texas transgender day of remembrance (Planet transgender)

In memory of Rita: attend a trans day of rembrance (Queer today.com)

Join the Fight! Disabled Student Fights to Live in University Dormitory

***ACTION ALERT***

via Justice For All

A community that excludes even one of its members is no community at all!

The following news and action alert comes to us from Micah Fialka-Feldman and his parents Rich and Janice:

Micah Fialka-Feldman has a cognitive impairment and has been a pioneer in inclusion (pictured right, photo from Charles V. Tines/ The Detroit News). Micah has been taking classes, participating in clubs, and currently pays full tuition at Michgan's Oakland University. In 2007, the university gave Micah a tour of the dormitory, accepted his deposit, confirmed his "move in date" and then said NO. In the last 60 days, the student body, the local media and people from across the country have expressed support for Micah's dream and the right of all Option Program students to live in the dormitory.

The Oakland University Board of Trustees received many letters of support and a clear message that Micah and other Option students should have the right to live in the dormitory. The November 5 board meeting was filled beyond capacity (more than 150 attendees). Student government leaders, peers, community disability activists, agency advocates, family and friends spoke out to change the policy. They spoke of Micah's impact on their personal lives, the campus and the belief that inclusion should include dormitory living. Many speakers recognized the pioneering contribution of OU and they challenged OU to take the next step.

The university continues to say "no" while the students say "yes." The student government and the committee will be hosting a campus wide forum on inclusive education and the right to live in the dormitory on November 19, 2008.

Take Action!

. Spread the word to the media, to disability activists and concerned community members across the country.
. Below are links to articles, interviews and You Tube videos.
. Please make comments after you view the You Tube videos
. Send the stories and articles to your local media friends.
. Get the story on CNBC, CNN, NPR, Oprah. It is time for national media coverage.
. Place the links on Face Book, on your favorite blog.
. Check out http://www.throughthesamedoor.com/
. Write Governor Jennifer Granholm at: P.O. Box 30013, Lansing, Michigan

Thank you for all your work and dedication.

Micah: micahff@aol.com
Rich and Janice: ruaw@aol.com

Media links:

Channel 4 TV Interview
Channel 2 - Fox TV Interview
Video Clips from the Board of Trustees Meeting on Nov 5 Board of Trusteesmeeting at OU (Comments from friends, student leaders and allies)
Micah's fight Continues, Oakland Post November 12,2008
OaklandPost Articles (University student newspaper)http://www.oaklandpostonline.com/read_article.php?id=560http://www.oaklandpostonline.com/read_article.php?id=557
Oakland Press News Article
Detroit News Article
Follow-up article on the Detroit News Web, November
6, 2008

RIP, Ricki Landers

Yesterday, the Salt Lake Tribune reported on the death on Sunday of disability activist and champion for child victims of domestic violence Ricki Landers. Ricki Landers was born in Biloxi, Mississipi, on January 24, 1957. In the 1970's, she moved to Utah, where she became an activist for many causes. Ms Landers, who died of liver failure, had multiple sclerosis and used a wheelchair for most of her adult life. She is survived by a son, Chris Andrews, and two sisters, Susie Robinson and Sandra McMillan. The title of her obituary in the Salt Lake Tribune is "I would rather go to jail than a nursing home," and is subtitled "Ricki Landers wasn't afraid to get arrested in her campaigns for disability rights." Below is an excerpt:

"She was on the forefront of arrests," said Barbara Toomer, a fellow activist through Utah's Disabled Rights Community Action Center (DRAC). "It was a badge of honor."

Landers would show up in Chicago to protest the lack of accommodations for wheelchairs at a major sports arena, or in Columbus, Ohio, to protest the policy against home health care.

"We would shut down entire buildings," said Toomer, "by placing our wheelchairs in the entrances of elevators so the doors wouldn't close. We wanted the people to know what it was like to be confined."

A champion for child victims of domestic violence, Landers would collect toys and items for youngsters in shelters, then organize parties when the gifts were delivered, said Janalee Tobias, who met Landers through Women Against Gun Control (WAGC).

"She would hold her homemade sign from her wheelchair at gun-rights rallies that said, "I can't kick a rapist where it counts." She also embroidered in pink a sign that she attached to her wheelchair that said, "Hell on Wheels."

"I've never met a more generous person in my life," said Toomer. "If she had a sweater and someone with her was cold, she would give that person her sweater."

Good reads #2

When wheels make the man, part 2 (a commentary on the incarnations of an "ugly" news story out of Darwin, Australia, by Kay over at Gimp Parade)

"What can I do?" (accessibility solutions are not simply structural; they require collective actions, writes Amandaw over at Three Rivers Fog)

Girls and getting a diagnosis (Kristina Chew at Autism Vox discusses a recent Newsweek article about girls and women with Asperger's syndrome)

My review: Mary McDonnel channels Rain Man for Grey's Anatomy role (Beth Haller, Media disndat)

In the swim of things (an article about paralympian Natalie du Toit in South Africa's The Times)

Playing in a wheelchair (Ruth, Wheelie Catholic)

Liz Carr: open letter counsels disabled man against assisted suicide

From the BBC News Magazine:

Noel Martin, a British construction worker who was paralyzed from the neck down after being attacked by neo-Nazis near Berlin 12 years ago, is planning a trip to Switzerland to commit suicide. Broadcaster Liz Carr, who met Carr for a BBC Radio 5 Live report, writes an open letter urging him to think again. Ms Carr herself has a disability and uses a wheelchair. Here is an excerpt:

One of the main problems I have with assisted suicide stories like yours, Noel, is that the media perpetuates the idea that to be disabled or ill must be the greatest tragedy of all. Disability inevitability equals no quality of life.

I know when people read your story, many will agree that yes, if they were in your situation then they would want to die too. Most people are so scared of illness, of disability, of getting older, that wanting assisted suicide is seen as an entirely rational desire. What scares me is that views like these will also be held by the doctors, the media, the courts, the government and all the others who have the power to decide if we live or die.

I'm sure by now you know how I feel about assisted suicide. Until the day when good quality health and social care are universally available regardless of age, impairment,race, gender or location, I believe there is no place for legalised assisted suicide.

I just think it's too easy for a society to promote assisted suicide as a right rather than work to overcome the barriers to supporting older, ill and disabled people to live fulfilled and valuable lives. Forget the right to die, isn't it more urgent that we campaign for the right not to be killed?

We may have differing perspectives on this debate but I think what we share is our respect for each other. Thank you for sharing your story with me and for letting me into your life. I hope your one-way ticket to Switzerland is an open one so we can continue this discussion over the coming years.

h/t to Media dis&dat

Memphis, Tenn: 5-year-old Anna Belle Hulgen's wheelchair is missing

An excerpt from Fox 13 News:

Memphis police confirm they are working to locate a custom made wheelchair believed to have been stolen early Monday morning from the 800 block of Chatwood in Highland Heights.

The chair belongs to five-year-old Anna Belle Hulgen. She is living with Spina bifida and is paralyzed from the waist down.

Jackie Jackson is the longtime caretaker of the five-year-old. She says, early Monday morning, she carried Anna Belle into her home to get her ready for school. It was a daily routine. But this time, when she went back outside to grab the wheelchair, it was gone. She says it was taken from the driveway in less than four minutes.

The girl's mother Christen said the wheelchair was symbol of Anna Belle's independence, something the five-year-old has struggled to achieve during her short years on this planet.

Family members believe the chair, which cost $8,000, may have been stolen to sell on the street for parts. They estimate the street value would be no more than $15.

Christen Hulgen hopes one of the wheelchair companies in the city will issue them a loaner chair until they can find a more permanent one. If you would like to help Hulgen, please e-mail her at HulganChristenB@mcsk12.net.

"I'm not selfish for wanting to live"

An excerpt from this article in the UK's Liverpool Daily Post:

Liverpool, United Kingdom: A paralysed Merseyside teacher has spoken of her anger that the growing public sympathy for assisted suicide means she is now seen as ‘selfish’ for wanting to carry on living.

Sue Garner-Jones last night criticised the way seriously disabled people who choose to end their lives are commonly described as ‘courageous’ and ‘selfless’.

Dr Garner-Jones has urged her MP, Southport’s John Pugh – himself a vocal opponent of euthanasia – to lead a campaign in support of people with spinal cord injuries who want to battle on with their lives.

Her plea came as MPs debated whether the law should be changed, so it would no longer be illegal to help terminally ill people to die – so-called ‘mercy killings’.

The issue of euthanasia first returned to the public consciousness when Hunts Cross man Reg Crew flew to Swiss clinic Dignitas in January 2003 to end his suffering from motor neurone disease. His wife Win is a strong supporter of legalising euthanasia.

Ministers were told more than 900 British people a year are getting illegal help to die.

Dr Garner-Jones chose to speak out following the ‘negative response towards disabled people’ made in the press last month after teenage rugby player Daniel James committed suicide. He was left paralysed after an accident and was also helped to die at the Swiss clinic.

Yesterday, Dr Garner-Jones told the Daily Post: “People make their own decisions about how to live their life. But there’s a lot of talk about bravery and courage for people who were opting out of living their lives. I didn’t like the inverse of that.

“To call this action ‘brave’, ‘courageous’ and ‘selfless’ implies that those of us who battle on are ‘cowardly’ and ‘selfish’, which is unfair and untrue.”

Dr Garner-Jones, 53, was paralysed from the chest down and has limited use of only her left hand after a lorry ploughed into her car 34-years-ago.

Now she is a part-time lecturer at Liverpool University and tutors Southport school children in English.

She can only write by clutching a pen with both hands and types her academic papers with a bent piece of wire.

Mr James’s parents said that after being left in a similar tetraplegic state, he was living only a ‘second class existence’.

Attacking the ‘hysteria’ surrounding his case, she warned: “I am seriously concerned that this might have a severely detrimental effect on anyone who lives with disability, or cares for someone in this situation, especially as Mr and Mrs James are referring to his life as a tetraplegic as ‘second class’.”

Although she says Mr and Mrs Jones’s love for their 23-year-old son is unquestioned, she wants to battle against the negative depiction of disability.

Speaking in her Birkdale home, she continued: “Someone who was newly injured, reading that in the papers or hearing someone having so negative views about living a life after a disability – that would be so discouraging to anyone who’d had a recent accident.

“His [Daniel James’s] parents thought they were doing the best for him. there’s no question about their love for him.”

h/t to Second Hand Smoke

'This is not a death sentence'

That's the title of this article about disability scholar and activist Chris Bell which appeared in Syracus University's student newspaper, the Daily Orange. Chris, who is presently a post-doctoral researcher at Syracuse University (where I'm also working), works in the area of HIV/AIDS and disability and the intersections of race, disability, sexuality and gender. He will be teaching a graduate seminar on HIV/AIDS and disability studies in American culture next semester. Here is an excerpt:

Bell woke up one morning in January 2002 the same way he had every other day since his diagnosis in 1997 - HIV positive and unashamed of it. But on that day, Bell discovered HIV/AIDS was defined as a legal disability, and Bell became a legally disabled person.

Bell received a flyer for a queer disability conference in San Francisco discussing the role of HIV/AIDS in the realm of legal disability, which sparked his interest in the cause. Since then, Bell has dedicated his life to studying HIV/AIDS for disabled persons in legal situations. "That was my entrance to work on disability as an identity, to disability studies and to disability activism," Bell said. "It was a life-changing experience and one of the best decisions I ever made."

Steven Taylor, centennial professor of disability studies at SU and Bell's boss, recruited Bell after working with him on Board of the Society of Disability Studies in 2006 at Towson University. "When I first met him, he impressed me as an up-and-coming scholar in disability studies," Taylor said. "When new postdoctoral fellowships became available at the Center on Human Policy, Law and Disability Studies, I contacted Chris and strongly encouraged him to apply."

Taylor described Bell as a "very engaging person," noting that he has yet to have a conversation with Bell that wasn't "an interesting and enjoyable discussion."

Taylor believes Bell is beyond being hurt by the ignorance and prejudices surround HIV/AIDS, and that Bell's knowledge and dedication is an example of the kind of professors SU should recruit.

"Chris is committed to social justice," Taylor said. "He recognizes the parallels between what people with disabilities have faced in society and the discrimination and marginalization members of other groups have experienced based on race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality."

Jersey Journal report: Jury awards $400,000 to deaf patient for denial of an interpreter

Hudson County, New Jersey - A rheumatologist who declined to provide an American Sign Language interpreter for a deaf lupus patient because it would cost him too much money has been ordered to pay her $4000,000 in damages, according to this report in The Jersey Journal. Here is an excerpt:

A Hudson County jury's $400,000 verdict for a deaf patient whose doctor refused her an interpreter may be a wake-up call for all professionals -- including lawyers -- that they risk liability for disability discrimination.

Worse, malpractice liability insurance does not usually cover such liability, says plaintiff's attorney Clara Smit.

Smit's client, Irma Gerena, claimed she repeatedly asked Jersey City rheumatologist Robert Fogari to hire an American Sign Language interpreter. Fogari said that as a solo practitioner, he couldn't afford the estimated $150 to $200 per visit an interpreter would cost.

Fogari treated Gerena for lupus for about 20 visits, stretched out over 20 months. He would sometimes exchange written words with her civil union partner, Lourdes Torres, who had better written English skills, and he also communicated with Gerena through the couple's 9-year-old daughter.

But Gerena claimed that for the most part, she was deprived of the opportunity to participate in and understand her medical situation and the treatment Fogari provided, including the attendant risks and alternative approaches. She kept seeing Fogari because her primary care physician had referred her to him; she was not sure of the nature of her illness and fearful about her worsening symptoms; and she could not just pick up the phone and find another doctor.

Gerena allegedly tried to get Fogari to change his mind, giving him an interpreter's business card and having the interpreter call him to explain the law to him, all to no avail. She switched doctors after Fogari told her to go to someone else because of her repeated requests, says Smit, an East Brunswick solo.

h/t to JFA