“Going to the Dogs?” A Workshop Series on Research at the Intersection of Disability and Animal Studies (Leeds, 19 February 2018)

Research Summary: Disability and Animal Studies Workshop Series

Event Type: Academic workshop series at the intersection of disability studies and animal studies

Primary Venue: Centre for Medical Humanities, School of English, University of Leeds

First Workshop Date: Monday, 19 February 2018, 2–5pm

Key Speakers: Karen Sayer (Medieval history), Sunny Harrison (Medieval studies), Leah Burch (Sociology and social policy)

Research Topics Covered: Medieval horse medicine and disability; nineteenth-century disabled labour and animal labour; disability animalisation in contemporary hate speech

Follow-up Events: Artistic event featuring Jenni-Juulia Wallinheimo-Heimonen (12 April 2018); second workshop (13 April 2018)

Cost: Free admission with advance booking

Accessibility: Contact Ryan Sweet to arrange necessary accommodations for attendance

Scholarly Basis: Responds to recent scholarship including Sunaura Taylor's work and Canadian Journal of Disability Studies call for papers

Format: Individual presentations followed by questions and closing roundtable discussion on ethical and methodological challenges

The first meeting of ‘“Going to the Dogs?” A Workshop Series on Research at the Intersection of Disability and Animal Studies’ will take place at the Centre for Medical Humanities in the School of English (6–10 Cavendish Road) at the University of Leeds on Monday 19 Feb 2018 from 2 – 5pm.

Responding to recent scholarship that places disability and animal studies in critical dialogue (see, for instance, Sunaura Taylor’s new book and the Canadian Journal of Disability Studies recent call for papers), this workshop will bring together three Leeds-based scholars, who will each approach the intersection of disability and animal studies from a different disciplinary and methodological perspective. The session will feature Karen Sayer, who is a Professor of Social and Cultural History at Leeds Trinity University; Sunny Harrison, who is a PhD candidate in the Institute for Medieval Studies at the University of Leeds; and Leah Burch, who is a PhD candidate in Sociology and Social Policy at the University of Leeds. Respectively, their talks will cover the following topics:

Models of utility, disability, and occupational health in later medieval horse medicine
The conceptualisation of disabled human labourers relative to conceptualisations of farm animals in nineteenth-century agriculture
Instances of disability being animalised in contemporary hate speech.

Each talk will be followed by time for questions, and the workshop will end with a roundtable discussion about the ethical and methodological challenges of working on themes of disability and animals together. Tea and coffee will be provided.

Please note that there will be a follow-up artistic event (starring the disability artist Jenni-Juulia Wallinheimo-Heimonen) at The Tetley during the evening on Thursday 12 April 2018 and a second workshop (featuring Andy Flack, Justyna Włodarczyk, Neil Pemberton, and Rachael Gillibrand) on Friday 13 April 2018 to which all are equally welcome.

If you have any questions or would like to book a place at the workshop in Feb – for FREE – please email Ryan Sweet (including details of anything that can be done to ensure that the event is accessible for you).