GRANT PROPOSAL
“Disability Studies at Purdue: A Network for Interdisciplinary
Graduate Collaboration”
Jessica Mehr, February 2012
I. ABSTRACT
Disability studies is a growing interdisciplinary field that aims to explore disability as a complex social, political, and cultural phenomenon, rather than an exclusively individual impairment. At Purdue, there are currently no convenient avenues for graduate students to pursue interdisciplinary research in disability studies; students are scattered over a number of departments and Colleges with no means to identify or contact one another. At the same time, there is little dialogue between Purdue’s disabled students and those researching disability-related topics. “Disability Studies at Purdue: A Network for Interdisciplinary Graduate Collaboration” aims to create a network to facilitate collaboration among graduate students and faculty whose research directly or indirectly relates to disability, as well as Purdue students who identify themselves as disabled. The first step of this project entails identifying graduate students and faculty with an interest in disability studies; assembling this information into a contacts database; and creating an email list-serve to promote events, share collaborative research opportunities, engage in discussions on issues, etc. These contacts will then be used as a jumping-off point for organizing two Disability Roundtable Discussions. These sessions will tackle disability-related issues and be led by discussion leaders who represent multiple disciplines and perspectives. In addition, emphasis will be placed on attracting members of Purdue’s disabled community to serve as both discussion leaders and attendees. The primary goals of this network are to foster interdisciplinary graduate education by creating opportunities for collaborative research, and to promote diversity by not only accommodating disabled students, but integrating their perspectives into Purdue’s research and curriculum. The project also seeks to increase Purdue’s awareness of an emerging and diverse interdisciplinary field.
II. PROJECT RATIONALE
Disability Studies: Goals and Necessity
Disability studies is a growing interdisciplinary field that aims to explore disability as a complex social, political, and cultural phenomenon, rather than exclusively as an individual impairment. It potentially draws from a broad range of disciplines, including English, Sociology, Anthropology, Philosophy, History, Law, Public Policy, Women’s Studies, Psychology, Biological Sciences, and Health Sciences. The field's goals include the following:
- To shift attention from individual impairments to the social and environmental barriers that marginalize the disabled (Shakespeare 267).
- To question our cultural constructions of “normalcy” and “institute alternate ways of thinking about the abnormal” (Davis 17).
- To “more fully integrate disabled people into higher education and show the significances of disability to all people” (Garland Thomson 1).
- To challenge the “academic division of labor” that separates the study of disability in the applied fields (rehabilitation, health sciences, etc.) from other areas of scholarly inquiry (Linton 2).
At Purdue, there are currently no convenient avenues for graduate students to pursue interdisciplinary research in disability studies. By dividing the curriculum, and excluding those who identify as disabled from scholarly research, Purdue runs the risk of creating “a partial or distorted picture of disability” that can negatively shape social practices and perceptions of the disabled on campus and beyond (Linton 76). It is therefore imperative that the Graduate School begins to facilitate collaboration among graduate students and faculty pursuing disability-related topics in the humanities, sciences, and applied fields, as well as engaging with Purdue’s disabled community. To this end, I propose the creation of a networking group that will help to connect those interested in the study of disability, and hold interdisciplinary discussion sessions to promote collaborative research, a sense of community, and diversity within the curriculum.
Institutional Gaps
Lack of Graduate Programs/ Opportunities for Collaboration
Interest in the field of disability studies has grown tremendously over the last decade, as evidenced by the formation of graduate degree programs at many of Purdue’s peer universities. The Ohio State University has offered a Graduate Interdisciplinary Specialization in disability studies since 2006, and the University of Illinois at Chicago has offered a Ph.D. in disability studies since 1998. Since Purdue’s Graduate School currently does not have a disability studies program, graduate students pursuing disability-related topics must do so in isolation, since they are scattered across dozens of departments and several Colleges, with no means to identify or contact one another. The absence of a collaborative network in disability studies denies graduate students the following opportunities:
• Conducting interdisciplinary research with students and faculty from other departments/schools, which could lead to conference papers, journal articles, and dissertations;
• Networking with faculty members in order to form interdisciplinary dissertation committees.
• Applying jointly with other students for interdisciplinary grant funding.
• Forming the supportive peer relationships that arise naturally among graduate students pursuing similar interests. This often includes independent writing/discussion groups and social interactions that aid in community formation and graduate student retention.
Correcting these gaps should be of strong interest to the Graduate School because of its established commitment to promoting interdisciplinary research. In 2004, the Office of Interdisciplinary Graduate Programs (OIGP) was established to facilitate interdisciplinary research, and the Graduate School’s Strategic Plan 2010-2015 sets the ambitious goal of increasing “the number of students involved in interdisciplinary graduate study by 30 percent” (18). Because it is a growing area that spans many fields, disability studies is an untapped resource that could help the Graduate School meet its interdisciplinary research goals.
Lack of Established Connections Between Academia and Disabled Community
Purdue has an established commitment to providing accommodations for disabled students and employees. The Disability Resource Center (DRC) currently works to facilitate “equal access and equal opportunity for students with disabilities in all facets of University life.” But there is currently no clear relationship between Purdue’s disabled students and graduate students/faculty researching disability-related topics. Many scholars in the field of disability studies identify themselves as disabled and use their own experiences as a source of scholarly inquiry; likewise, it’s probable that disabled students with no ties to the field would be interested in bringing their perspectives to an academic discussion. Bridging the gap between scholarly theory and practical experience can serve as a means “to gain power for disabled people through organizing and coalescing people, resources, and knowledge” (Linton 119). This could also create opportunities to integrate this knowledge into Purdue’s curriculum in a way that diversifies the perspectives of all students.
III. PROJECT DESCRIPTION, OBJECTIVES, AND METHODS
“Disability Studies at Purdue: A Network for Interdisciplinary Graduate Collaboration” aims to foster collaborative relationships among graduate students and faculty whose research directly or indirectly addresses disability-related issues, as well as Purdue students who identify themselves as disabled. This year-long project will entail two stages: 1) Identification of Interested Parties and 2) Disability Roundtable Discussions.
- The first step entails identifying graduate students and faculty conducting research relevant to disability studies through targeted emails to departments, degree programs, organizations, and faculty members. These graduate students may explicitly identify themselves as operating within the field of disability studies, may recognize the implicit impact their work has on the disabled, or may never have considered their research through the lens of disability. This information will then be assembled into a contacts database and used to create an ITAP email list-serve to promote events, share research opportunities, engage in discussions, etc.
- The contacts database will then be used as a jumping-off point for organizing a minimum of two Disability Roundtable Discussions during my fellowship term. These sessions will tackle a predetermined issue within the field, and will be led by graduate student and faculty “discussion leaders” representing multiple disciplines/perspectives. In addition, I will strive to attract members of the disabled community to participate in these dialogues and the list-serve.
1) Identification of Interested Parties
The following Colleges, departments, and programs should be particularly targeted:
College of Liberal Arts / Humanities
Graduate students in the humanities are the most likely to identify themselves as pursuing disability studies; however, they currently work in isolation. Scholar Michael Berube identifies a strong need for interdisciplinary study within the humanities, arguing that if universities cannot imagine disability as a “broad, general subject that shapes the humanities, it is all the less likely that we will manage to imagine disability as a broad, general subject that shapes public life and public policy” (quoted by Linton viii). Graduate programs within the College of Liberal Arts that are likely to have students interested in disability-related topics include Anthropology, History, English, Political Science, Philosophy, Sociology, American Studies (Interdisciplinary), African American Studies (Interdisciplinary), and Women’s Studies (Interdisciplinary).
College of Science
While graduate students in the sciences are less likely to identify themselves as belonging to the field of disability studies, there are numerous research programs in the College of Science with important ramifications to the study of disability and the disabled. The Department of Biological Sciences, for example, includes graduate programs in Development and Disease, Developmental Neurobiology, and Genetics. While many proponents of disability studies are striving to counter the classification of disability as pathological or biologically abnormal, collaboration between the sciences and humanities allows for a more well-informed dialogue on disability issues. For example, since most graduate students within the humanities lack an advanced knowledge of genetics, conducting an isolated debate on prenatal genetic testing for disabilities is problematic. At the same time, graduate students pursuing genetic research may not always consider how even “the most basic building blocks of medicine and biology” are “rife with social meaning and consequences” (Linton 87).
College of Health and Human Sciences
There is some dissonance between the ideologies of disability studies in the humanities (analyzing and changing social and cultural constructions) and those associated with medicine and the health sciences (individual care and treatment). In academia, however, dissonance provides an argument for interdisciplinary collaboration, not against it. Many of the graduate students in the College of Health and Human Sciences are preparing for a lifetime not as researchers, but practitioners, who will spend their careers diagnosing, treating, and caring for disabled individuals. Their valuable perspectives, added to those of disabled individuals and students in the humanities and sciences, would provide a multi-faceted view of contentious issues, with the potential to create new understandings/knowledge. Programs to target include Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences; Psychological Sciences; Health and Kinesiology; Human Development and Family Studies; and Nursing.
2) Disability Roundtable Discussions
The database of interested parties will be used as a jumping-off point for holding at least two Disability Roundtable Discussions during the fellowship term. These sessions will be on predetermined issues of relevance to multiple disciplines, with the goal of attracting graduate students and faculty from numerous fields, as well as members of Purdue’s disabled community.
Format
In order to provide focus, discussion leaders representing multiple perspectives on the issue will be secured in advance, and asked to prepare a brief (5-10 minute) introduction to the issue as well as some potential talking points. Attendees will then join in the discussion, responding to arguments, posing questions, etc. Unlike a traditional conference-style panel in which the presenters are separated from the audience, the room will be organized to promote a sense of equality. Each event will then be followed by a reception with light refreshments in order to encourage networking among students, faculty, and other attendees.
Publicity/Planning
These events will be executed by leveraging my professional experience coordinating and publicizing academic seminars, conferences, and receptions for the NEXTRANS Center at Purdue University Discovery Park, and Sycamore Review (Purdue’s literary journal). Each event will be advertised via targeted emails to the contact list, department emails, and professionally printed postcards designed (by me) using Adobe InDesign. In order to facilitate participation and attendance, publicity materials will include an abstract summarizing the scholarly debate on the issue, and list potential lines of inquiry. Support from the Disability Resource Center will also be solicited in publicizing events to students with disabilities.
Topics
The first session topic will be the broadest in order to attract as many disciplines and attendees as possible. More specific topic ideas include the following:
- Deafness in Popular Culture
- Genetic Testing: Is it Eugenics?
- Mental Illness as Disability: The Politics of Forced Treatment
III. GOALS & OUTCOMES
Strategic Initiatives
This project meets all of the Graduate School’s Strategic Initiatives:
- It foster interdisciplinary graduate education by connecting graduate students and faculty across departments and Colleges, which could lead to collaborative research ideas/projects, conference papers, journal articles, and interdisciplinary dissertations.
- It enhances the recruitment and retention of graduate students, which increases diversity because the aim is not to accommodate, but to integrate students with disabilities into Purdue’s research and curriculum. This can help to attract and retain students with disabilities, and demonstrate the significance of disability-related issues to everyone, thus creating a more inclusive environment.
- It provides opportunities to establish mentoring relationships between faculty and students that could lead to interdisciplinary theses/dissertations.
- It enhances the quality of life for graduate students currently pursuing disability-related research in isolation by helping them to develop the supportive peer relationships that usually arise naturally among graduate students pursuing similar interests.
- It may attract external and internal sources of funding through joint student applications for interdisciplinary grant funding.
Measuring Success
Short-term success in this project will be measured by the number of graduate students, faculty members, and disabled individuals who join the network and attend the Roundtable Discussions. Qualitatively, success will be measured by the value of connections made academically and interpersonally, the generation of viable interdisciplinary research topics, and the overall desire to continue the collaborative network after the fellowship term expires. A final measure of the project will be its success at drawing Purdue’s attention to the emerging field of disability studies. One of the Graduate School’s key missions is to “explore opportunities for new interdisciplinary graduate programs from among existing interdisciplinary research efforts on campus” (Strategic Plan 18). This means that for disability studies to have a programmatic future at Purdue, interdisciplinary research efforts must first be granted avenues to exist.
IV. CURRENT PROGRESS & SUPPORT
My initial contacts with faculty, students, and staff have generated a great deal of enthusiasm. I submitted my Proposal to Susan Swensen at the Disability Resource Center on January 31, 2012 and it is currently under review. The following faculty members have already offered to support the project:
• Director Laurel Weldon, Center for Research on Diversity and Inclusion
• Dr. Lata Krishnan, Clinical Professor, Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences
• Professor Lorraine Kisselburgh, Brian Lamb School of Communication
• Professor Andrew Buckser, Department of Anthropology
• Professor Angelica Duran, Department of English, Director of Religious Studies
• Professor Maren Linett, Department of English (Faculty Endorser)
V. BUDGET (EVENTS)
Promotional materials (Postcards, flyers, signage, etc.) $250.00
Refreshments (Excluding alcohol) $400.00
AV set-up and/or other incidental Purdue room costs $100.00
Total Cost of Project $750.00
VI. WORKS CITED
Davis, Lennard. “Constructing Normalcy.” The Disability Studies Reader. New York: Routledge, 2010.
Linton, Simi. Claiming Disability. New York: New York University Press, 1998
Shakespeare, Tom. “The Social Model of Disability.” The Disability Studies Reader. New York: Routledge, 2010.
Garland Thomson, Rosemarie. “Why We Need Disability Studies in the Humanities.” Disability Studies Quarterly 30.3 (2010).
“The Graduate School Strategic Plan 2010-2015,” Purdue University.
Copyright Jessica Mehr 2012