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Dis/Ability on Screen: An Exploration of Diversity and Education on Display

Collaborative LJMU Curriculum Enhancement Student Internship Project 2018-2019 Liverpool John Moores University – School of Education and Liverpool Screen School Liverpool, UK, 24th January-12th June 2019

Building on the success of a 2017-2018 School of Education-initiated LJMU Curriculum Enhancement Student Internship project called “Film Freaks: Denaturalising Common Views on Dis/Ability and Education”, and following discussions with colleagues from the Liverpool Screen School, this project has sought to extend and further develop the 2017-2018 Film Freaks project as “Dis/ability on Screen: An Exploration of Diversity and Education on Display”. Dis/Ability on Screen embodies a collaborative partnership between LJMU’s School of Education and Liverpool Screen School aiming to unleash students’ & staff’s creative potential in facilitating synergies between film, disability and education as related interest fields. This taps into a need identified in both Schools, namely: that of supporting students in engaging with film, disability and education with a view to enhancing their understanding of the potential of each element (i.e.: film, disability, and education) to productively complicate common views of any of the other elements. These three elements each constitute a lens through which to look at societies anew.

Dis/Ability on Screen offers an excellent opportunity for fruitful collaboration between LJMU’s Screen School and School of Education, with both Schools soon becoming part of the same Faculty (Arts and Professional & Social Studies). The project helps to foster a genuine sense of community in and across both Schools (building on shared interests, e.g.: audiovisual media, technologies of learning) and to gather different windows onto film, education and disability. Through this collaboration, Dis/ability on Screen further innovates and develops the curricula of both Schools. Both the Liverpool Screen School and the School of Education, in light of LJMU’s Strategic Plan are equally committed to providing an enriching extra-curricular learning experience that sees students and staff collaboratively working together, here teasing apart key themes and concerns related to disability, representation through media like film, and education. As was highlighted by student interns on the 2017-2018 “Film Freaks” project, participants develop a stronger sense of identity as students & staff and also come to feel part of a community through such collaborations. Dis/Ability on Screen seeks to nurture such invaluable experiences and further develop such genuine senses of belonging.

Staff involved in the project include the project leaders (Clara Kassem & Geert Thyssen) and two staff from the Liverpool Screen School having expressed interest in supporting Dis/Ability on Screen in terms of student recruitment, involvement of the broader (e.g.: the Deaf) community etc. (Eleanor Yules and John Maxwell). Dis/Ability on Screen film screenings/seminars, designed for both students and staff have run from 28th March to 8th April 2019 at LJMU’s Redmonds Building, offering a creative space for students and staff to discuss and debate contemporary and historical views of children, young people, and adults termed ‘disabled’ or as having ‘disabilities’ and/or ‘special -‘ or ‘additional needs’; to consider ‘education’ as an enabling and/or disabling project; to evaluate the extent to which ‘disability’ as represented nowadays is different from and/or similar to ‘freakery’ (e.g.: Bogdan, 1990; Shakespeare, 1994 Garland-Thompon, 1996; Verstraete, 2012; Richardson, 2018); and to explore issues around editing choices, screen-writing and film production through a range of different film genres.

The School of Education has generously offered additional funds to support Dis/Ability on Screen, which has allowed for the provision of a British Sign Language interpreter at two of the four student-led Dis/Ability on Screen showings/film seminars. The project leaders herewith gladly thank the School of Education for the financial support offered.

References

  • Bogdan, R. (1990). Freak show: Presenting human oddities for amusement and profit. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
  • Garland-Thomson, R. (1996). Freakery: Cultural spectacles of the extraordinary body. New York/London: New York University Press.
  • Richardson, N. (2018). The invisibles: Disability, sexuality and new strategies of enfreakment. In: C. Smith, F. Attwood and B. McNair (eds.). The Routledge companion to media, sex and sexuality. Oxon: Routledge.
  • Shakespeare, T. (1994). Cultural representations of disabled people: Dustbins for disavowal. Disability & Society, vol. 9, (3): 283-299.
  • Verstraete, P., Van Hooste, A., Thyssen G., & Catteeuw, K. (2004). “Het is maar hoe je het Bekijkt: Een Experiment met Filmseminaries voor Orthopedagogiek en Historische Pedagogiek.” Leuvens Bulletin LAPP, vol. 53: 47-66.
  • Verstraete, P. (2012). In the shadow of disability: Reconnecting history, identity and politics. Opladen/Berlin/Torino: Barbara Budrich Publishers.