POSTPONED: Archive and Theory: The Future of Anglo-American Early Modern Disability Studies [Day 1]

This event is postponed, as we continue to monitor the COVID-19 situation daily and follow the public gathering guidelines set by UCLA, our local government officials, and the CDC. Please check our website for future updates.

–conference organized by by Helen Deutsch (UCLA), Jason Farr (Marquette University), Paul Kelleher (Emory University), and Jared Richman (Colorado College)

Co-sponsored by UCLA’s Dean of Humanities, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Undergraduate Education Initiatives-Disability Studies, Department of English, Department of History, and Joyce Appleby Chair of America in the World Chair Fund

Over the last two decades, the cultural and historical study of disability has emerged as a vital field of inquiry, transforming how we understand various forms of corporeal and cognitive difference in the early modern period. In turn, the increasing scholarly focus on earlier periods has pressing implications for our constructions of disability in the present. This conference aims to foster two overlapping and mutually illuminating conversations: one about the role that theory plays in how we represent and interpret archival sources, and another about how the archive invites us to critique the historical assumptions and (at times) limitations of theoretical inquiry. Among the many questions this conference will raise, we anticipate that our participants will ask: How do we define “archive,” and how is archival knowledge organized? What theoretical approaches will allow us to move forward in our uncovering of disabled pasts? How does the historical distance embodied by the archive inspire us to further diversify and complicate our theoretical models and strategies? How can sustained scholarly attention to archives of disability open up new possibilities for conversation between the fields of disability studies and medical humanities, whose relationship was aptly termed that of “frenemies” at an MLA panel some years ago? In short, how does our simultaneous embrace of the archive and theory promise to open up new horizons both for the study of early modern disability and for disability studies?

Speakers
Sari Altschuler, Northeastern University
Cornelia H. Dayton, University of Connecticut
D. Christopher Gabbard, University of North Florida
Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Emory University
Nancy J. Hirschmann, University of Pennsylvania
Essaka Joshua, University of Notre Dame
Travis Chi Wing Lau, University of Texas at Austin
Rachael C. Lee, University of California, Los Angeles
Genevieve Love, Colorado College
Emily B. Stanback, University of Southern Mississippi
David M. Turner, Swansea University
Jarred Wiehe, Texas A&M University, Corpus Christi
Katherine Schaap Williams, University of Toronto

Program

There is no charge for this event. Advance booking is requested.

After booking Day 1 below please remember to also book your spot for Day 2.