I’m glad to have another opportunity to talk about the unique situation disabled people face as we tackle climate change. I’ll be speaking at this event as part of the Greater Dandenong Sustainability Festival and Libraries After Dark at Springvale Library.
Climate change is happening now, and it affects everyone, including people with disabilities. Join us and several special guests as we discuss this topic and hear your views and thoughts. You will also learn how people with a disability can prepare for and stay comfortable during extreme weather events.
If you’re local I’d love to see you at the Springvale Library in the Springvale Community Hub, but for those not able to make it in person the session will be recorded and available to watch after it has taken place.
Mobile bookstore On the Road Books on its first outing at a Melbourne market
I’ve been a lover of books since I could listen to them on my Fisher Price tape deck as a child. I’ve also been lucky enough to work with books, literature and writing in Australia for a long time and I have such deep respect for what it takes to get a book published and into the hands of readers.
Not long ago it came to my attention that some (not all!) op shops get so many donated books that every so often they just clear the shelves and throw all the books into the bin. To say I was horrified is not hyperbole. It’s true that many op shops are clogged with enough Clive Cussler books to build a structural wall, but hidden in these shelves are also amazing books, many written by Australian authors, that have lots of life left in them.
Enter On the Road Books. I’m saving great books that are languishing on op shop shelves and curating the best of these to be sold online and on this cute-as-a-button mobile bookstore.
It is my hope that this venture will find new homes for secondhand books which may otherwise languish unappreciated on op-shop shelves or (horror of all horrors) end up in landfill. None of us have the space to keep all the books we read, no matter how much we love them. Ending up in an op shop is not an indication of a book’s worth and there are so many amazing books available.
With a curated collection of high-quality titles on offer, On the Road Books gives great literature another round of life in readers’ hands.
To celebrate the launch of We’ve Got This – the first major anthology of writing by parents with disabilities – a panel of the book’s contributors will discuss the complexities of parenting from this often overlooked perspective.
In We’ve Got This, twenty-five parents who identify as Deaf, disabled or chronically ill discuss the highs and lows of their parenting journeys. The result is a moving and empowering collection that captures all the joy, anxiety and love that comes with being a disabled parent – and reveals that often, the greatest obstacle is other people’s attitudes.
The anthology’s editor, musician Eliza Hull, will be joined by writer and academic Shakira Hussein, activist and educator Jax Jacki Brown, and speaker and creator of the ABC podcast Look Mum, No Hands Mandy McCracken for an inclusive and expansive discussion about their experiences of parenting while living with disability.
I’m incredibly proud to be included in this anthology published today by Black Inc. which gathers together stories from disabled parents from Australia. My chapter reflects on how my feminism and disability politics have informed my parenting and vice versa. Spoiler alert: they’re impossible to extricate from each other!
Whether you’re a parent, a person with a disability or have a disabled parent or parent-to-be in your life, this collection is a terrific way to learn about the resilience and tenacity of our community.
You can purchase the book at your local independent bookstore or here online.
How does a father who is blind take his child to the park? How is a mother with dwarfism treated when she walks her child down the street? How do Deaf parents know when their baby cries in the night?
When writer and musician Eliza Hull was pregnant with her first child, like most parents-to-be she was a mix of excited and nervous. But as a person with a disability, there were added complexities. She wondered: Will the pregnancy be too hard? Will people judge me? Will I cope with the demands of parenting? More than 15 per cent of Australian households have a parent with a disability, yet their stories are rarely shared, their experiences almost never reflected in parenting literature.
In We’ve Got This, twenty-five parents who identify as Deaf, disabled or chronically ill discuss the highs and lows of their parenting journeys and reveal that the greatest obstacles lie in other people’s attitudes. The result is a moving, revelatory and empowering anthology. As Rebekah Taussig writes, ‘Parenthood can tangle with grief and loss. Disability can include joy and abundance. And goddammit – disabled parents exist.’
Contributors include Jacinta Parsons, Kristy Forbes, Graeme Innes AM, Jessica Smith OAM, Jax Jacki Brown OAM, Nicole Lee, Elly May Barnes, Neangok Chair, Renay Barker-Mulholland, Micheline Lee and Shakira Hussein. We’ve Got This will appeal to readers of Growing Up Disabled in Australia and other titles in the Growing Up series.
‘Full of deep, beautiful, important stories. I’ve learnt so much from this book.’—Clare Bowditch, musician, actress and radio presenter
