Category: Disability studies

The Play World: Helen Keller Writes About Vaudeville

[“The Play World” is Chapter 13 of Midstream: My Later Life, 1929, in which Keller describes her experience of vaudeville and the circumstances that led her to it. I lightly edited and hyperlinked it from a scan of the original.] THE picture was not a financial success. My sense of pride mutinies against my confession; but we are the kind… Read more

Resonating With the Visible, genesis of a Poem

I was sewing–I hand-sew, as you can read about in Sewing Blind–and listening to the series of interviews Bill Moyers had with Joseph Campbell in the last year of his life (1987), collectively called The Power of Myth, when I heard Moyers preface his next question with this: “We talked about the effect of the hunting plain on mythology, this… Read more

The Sea Spells, Helen Keller’s Favorite Books

“Books have been my most intimate companions,” wrote Helen Keller in a letter to a suitor in 1922. There can be little doubt that Helen derived much pleasure from the solitary communion of reading. That much of this pleasure was escapist in the extreme, she freely admits, “More than at any other time, when I hold a beloved book in… Read more

Disability Pride Parades Matter

Disability Pride Parades celebrate difference, explode stigma and combat shame!   If you did not know that Disability Pride Month came to a close yesterday, you would be forgiven as, in NYC at least, it is only a year old. Mayor de Blasio declared July to be Disability Pride Month last year in honor of the 25th anniversary of the… Read more

Exploding Stigma with Heidi Latsky Dance

#MeOnDisplay means exploding stigma! Earlier this week, I received information about an open rehearsal/audition with Heidi Latsky Dance and thought it sounded fun; I haven’t danced in a while and I decided that, whether or not I’d be accepted into the performance, it would be a cool experience. I did not realize the experience would begin before I even got… Read more

Sewing Blind, Refashioning perceptions

My blind sewing adventure began about seven years ago when on a whim I searched for, and found, sewing needles at MaxiAids, a website that sells disabled people gadgets. As with so many of the great things that have happened in recent years to enhance my life as my sight fails, the technology inspired the activity and the activity inspired… Read more