Episode 49- Accessibility and Representation
0-0:12 Orthotonics Accessible as Gravity plays and fades out
0:13 Hello and welcome to Accessagogy a podcast about accessibility and pedagogy. I’m your host Ann Gagné and this podcast is recorded on land covered by the Upper Canada Treaties and within land protected by the Dish with One Spoon Wampum Agreement, which is the traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe peoples.
0:32 Welcome to episode forty-nine. In today’s episode, which again may be a bit of a mini-sode, which echoes the sort of end of term of times that we are in with longer to do lists and folk have a lot of things to do so I wanted to create a bit of a shorter piece that will fit in those time constraints. And it’s an episode about representation. It sort of builds on what I discussed way back in episode 23 about what accessible education spaces look like or feel like, by focusing on the need for disability representation in the work we do.
1:04 As multiple means representation of course is one of the three UDL principles so anyone doing inclusive pedagogy work should be used to conversations about the need for representation. I want to take this a step further and get us to think about what those representations of disability mean to learners, but also what those representations mean to teaching team members and staff at the institutions. And I mention this because this isn’t only about disability and accessibility, though that is where I’m going to focus on today, but rather it’s about having an awareness about how much representation impacts so many whose positionalities mean they identify as marginalized or multimarginalized.
1:50 So the first point I want to make is that when it comes to disability, and again any other inclusive positionality conversations, there’s a real need for learners to see themselves in their institutions. This means having disabled faculty teaching courses, this means having disabled support staff who do the work of connection both academic and physical or mental health supports wise for the learners. And this of course is a complex thing, because so many disabilities are non-apparent, and thus the representation means that a certain kind of disclosure which may not feel safe for the instructor, the staff, or members of the teaching team.
2:33 Thus, the connected point is that representation doesn’t always have to happen within the lecture hall. Representation can happen in office hours, it can happen in institutional communications- in a non-stereotypical tokenistic way. Representation can be about who wrote the texts that are part of the readings in the class, but it can just as much be about the way that disability is flagged in office spaces.
2:59 Part of this representation is about an awareness that it requires a lot of buy in from the institution at a time when conversations about equity and inclusion are actually just being shut down. So, for example, an awareness of if your office space can support mobility devices, or even if there is accessible office space or meeting space on campus. So many of our lecture halls and lab spaces are not accessible, that the office and meeting space accessibility is often forgotten in these conversations.
3:31 So this takes me to point two in terms of representation, which is realize that representation extends beyond the learners. What I mean by that is that disabled teaching team members and staff members are looking for those representative touch points as well. They want to connect with others who may have a shared lived experience and they want to have the space for that to happen, and an institutionally supported mechanism for that to happen as well.
3:57 So often when it comes to representation pieces, the discourse is, well if you want a representative piece or place you need to build it yourself. Which is so incredibly isolating, but also does another kind of work, which is that it tells the students that the support for representation is not holistic. It gives the message that conversations about disability representation and accessibility will remain in places such as student services or accessibility services, but if there happens to be someone who identifies as disabled outside of those spheres, then this doesn’t have any importance unless People and Culture are doing survey numbers.
4:37 And this is important to remember because the thing is that students want to see themselves in this institutional population, and they, and if you don’t institutionally provide support for those whose positionalities are not demographically overwhelming at the institution like white, Christian, non-disabled heterosexual then the students will also not feel like this a place of belonging for them, and that the belonging seems forced.
5:05 Finally, point three, as the UDL guidelines note about representation, language is so very important. So what kind of language is being used in departmental communications, in marketing information? What kind of slogans are repeated time and again about your institution? Are these communication pieces inclusive or are they ableist or do they do another kind of exclusionary work in their connotative abilities? And oftentimes it’s only by having more inclusive communities at the institution that those connotative pieces are flagged as maybe being problematic or ableist.
5:40 So that’s it, that’s episode 49 of Accessagogy, with a bit of a reflection on how important a holistic representation is to making disabled learners as well as disabled teaching team members, and staff, feel like they can belong in a place.
5:54 Remember as well that I want this to be a space where you can ask questions and share concepts that you’d like me to discuss. So, if there’s anything that I mentioned here, about accessible representation and what that could look like in a more holistically way in the programs that you support in the professional development that need, please ask.
6:12 As always if you have any ideas or aspects of your pedagogy that you would like me to address in this podcast, please feel free to send me an email at Accessagogy so that’s acc e ss a gogy at gmail dot com. I will try to include as many of these suggestions as possible in the podcast because ultimately, this podcast is for you. So that’s it, that’s episode 49 of Accessagogy, thanks so much for following along and asking how can I make my space more accessible today? I hope you have a good and inclusively representative week.