David T. Mitchell, Professor and Executive Director of the Institute on Disabilities, Temple University
Sharon Snyder, Assistant Professor of Disability and Human Development, University of Illinois-Chicago
Mitchell and Snyder are the co-editors of the University of Michigan Press series Corporealities: Discourses of Disability, and of The Body and Physical Difference (1997). They also co-authored Narrative Prosthesis: Disability and the Dependence of Discourse (2000) and Cultural Locations of Disability (2006).
Their paper looks at the various ways that independent disability film festivals provide a unique lens from which to assess the political project of disabled peoples’ integration (or lack thereof) on a global scale. The authors assess the sustainability of such cultural efforts at ideological and aesthetic re-programming with particular attention paid to disabled people as a critical reference point for measuring the efficacy of social justice initiatives.
Sponsorship: ISLA