Department of English

Central University of Rajasthan

in association with

Indian Disability Studies Collective

invites papers for

IDSC INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE 2023

on the theme

Disability and the Everyday: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Disability has a long history of being a category of difference that is accorded extraordinary, negative, and exclusionary status in most socio-cultural contexts. Disability's exclusivity is often marked by the special recognition it is given in population statistics that has contributed significantly in identifying disabled people as a minoritized group. However, disabled people are oppressively excluded from social worlds, discussions, debates, events, and everyday life in general. Such an exclusion can be understood through Rosemarie Garland-Thomson's identification of the normate as "the constructed identity of those who, by way of the bodily configurations and cultural capital they assume, can step into a position of authority and wield the power it grants them" (1997). The vantage point of the normate, therefore, prescribes the engagement with disability as 'special', 'extraordinary' or 'abnormal', adjectives commonly associated with disabled people's lives that locate disability as a non-normative category.

Disability studies has robustly presented a disability-centric episteme that foregrounds disabled people and not the medico-legal normates as 'experts' of and on disability. Disability is a part of our everyday reality and disabled people have 'everyday' lives that do not include being identified as a special social group for administrative and other purposes. Undeniably, disability persists as an everyday category and belongs in equal measure to the realms of the ordinary and the common. Disablement is experienced on a daily basis, and disabled people are regular recipients of ableist and dehumanizing images and expressions that devalue them, are subject to care and medical treatment aimed at 'fixing' the 'deficit' of disability and become excluded in newer ways all the time. How would research on disability as an everyday category or phenomenon enable us to depart further from adjectives that alienate and bring us closer to narratives that belong?

The Third Annual Conference of the Indian Disability Studies Collective, to be held at the Department of English, Central University of Rajasthan from 8th to 10th February 2023, invites scholars to deliberate on disability in the realm of everyday life and share their research in the field. Though the conference is open to scholars from all the disciplines, the emphasis will remain on approaches that are oriented towards literary, cultural and media studies. While there are multiple trajectories that could be explored in relation to this theme, some of the ideas that could be explored include:

• Everyday worlds of different impairment groups and the materiality of representation
• Disability perpetuations in mass media: production and reception
• Everyday expressions of disability: language and aesthetics
• Narratives of access: disability access on a day-to-day basis that goes beyond physical infrastructure
• Cognition, the affective realm, and disability sociality
• Life-writing of disabled people
• Interrogation and subversion of normalcy and ableism through a reversal of the gaze
• Narratives of everyday caregiving and care-receiving
• Disability intersectionality: interaction of disability with other aspects of subjectivity
• Subjective constitution and erasure of disability
• Disability and religion: faith and practices of disabled people
• Disability and the politics of the medical and neuro-cognitive paradigms
• Empowerment and social justice and the matrix of disability in our daily lives
• Disability and the everyday experiences in education and employment

Prospective participants are requested to send 300 words abstract toidscconf2023@gmail.com   with a 50-word bio-note.

Points to Remember

• Conference Dates: 8th- 10th February 2023
• Abstract (300 words) Submission Deadline: 31st December 2022
• Results of abstract review returned to authors: 10th January 2023
• Registration Fee: INR 2500 for paper presenters (excluding accommodation)

    INR 3500 for paper presenters (with accommodation)

• Final date of registration and fee payment: 31st January 2023
• For any questions or queries please write to: idscconf2023@gmail.com

Note: Only members of the IDSC are eligible to present their papers at the conference. The membership fee may be paid at the time of registration or paid through online transfer at the venue. The details of the same will be provided when candidates are intimated on the selection of abstracts. The membership categories are:

Students - 500 INR

Employed professionals (Annual) - 1000 INR 

Membership for 3 years - 2500 INR

Life Membership (10yrs) - 6500 INR

Conference Committee

CENTRAL UNIVERSITY OF RAJASTHAN:

Patron

Prof. Anand Bhalerao

Vice Chancellor, Central University of Rajasthan

Advisor

Dr. Sanjay Arora

Dean, School of Humanities & Languages, CURAJ

Convener

Dr. Bhumika Sharma

Head, Department of English, CURAJ

Organizing Secretary

Dr. Devendra Rankawat

Assistant Professor, Department of English

Organizing Committee

Dr. Neha Arora, Dr. Ved Prakash, Dr. Savita Andelwar

IDSC:

Chairperson

Prof. Someshwar Sati

Kirori Mal College, Delhi University

Vice-Chairperson

Prof. Shilpa Das

Interdisciplinary Design Studies, NID Ahmedabad

Prof. Banibrata Mahanta

Department of English, Banaras Hindu University

Secretary

Dr. Mukul Chaturvedi

Zakir Hussain Delhi College, Delhi University

Joint-Secretary

 Sandeep R. Singh

School of Letters, AUD

Dr. Anurima Chanda

Dept. of English, Birsa Munda College, NBU

Treasurer

Ritwick Bhattacharjee

SGTB Khalsa College, Delhi University