LIVING WITH DISABILITIES IN COLONIAL AMERICA: A presentation by Laurel Daen, Asst. Professor in the Department of American Studies at the University of Notre Dame
When: Jan 25, 2024 07:00 PM (ONLINE – ZOOM)
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Have you ever asked yourself what life was like for those with physical or intellectual disabilities in Colonial America? Were people kind, indifferent or harsh? Was there a difference in treatment between those born with disabilities vs. those who became disabled later in life? And how did Indigenous people treat the disabled at the time?
Answers to these and many more questions will be discussed at the The Hurley Heritage Society’s January lecture – “Living with disabilities in colonial America” presented by Laurel Daen, Asst. Professor in the Department of American Studies at the University of Notre Dame.
The lecture will discuss what life was like for people with physical and intellectual disabilities in colonial America and colonial times; how did gender, race, and class affect the experience of impairment; regional differences; how definitions and perceptions of disability change over time.
This lecture examines the everyday lives of diverse peoples with disabilities in colonial America, paying particular attention to the prejudice and discrimination they experienced as well as their efforts to gain greater autonomy and opportunity.
This lecture is open and free to the public.
You are invited to a Zoom meeting.
When: Jan 25, 2024 07:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
REGISTER IN ADVANCE REQUIRED FOR THIS MEETING:
NOTE: After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
About Speaker Laurel Daen
Laurel Daen is an Assistant Professor of American Studies at the University of Notre Dame with concurrent appointments in Gender Studies; Health, Humanities, and Society; and the History and Philosophy of Science. Her research and teaching focus on disability, sickness, medicine, and health in America, primarily during the 18th and 19th centuries. She is currently completing her first book, which examines the exclusion of disabled people from legal and political rights in the early United States. The book also documents how disabled people resisted these exclusions, recovering an early history of disability rights activism. This project has received support from two National Endowment for the Humanities grants and is set to be published as part of the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture’s series at the University of North Carolina Press. In addition to this book, Daen has articles published or forthcoming in Technology and Culture, Journal of Social History, Journal of the Early Republic, Early American Literature, and History Compass, among other publications. Her article for the Journal of the Early Republic won the Outstanding Article and Book Chapter Award from the Disability History Association in 2018.
Before coming to Notre Dame, Daen earned her Ph.D. from William & Mary and held long-term National Endowment for the Humanities fellowships at the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture and the Massachusetts Historical Society. While at William & Mary, she received the Distinguished Dissertation Award in the Humanities and Social Sciences and the John E. Selby Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Instruction.
