This article is written by Kairani Baroka, an artist, educator and writer. She has dedicated the article to her pen her experience and lessons learned from touring a show on pain with limited access to resources . Whilst conducting those shows she was in sever pain . She writes of her experience as an Indonesian woman who toured UK, Australia and India for her artistic show, in particular performing in Deaf Accessible venues.
She tells her story of not being heard by health system on the host country even she had access to student insurance. She was not visible enough as being a woman of different ethnicity with international background.
She draws reader’s attention to issues such as intersection of accessibility, and framing of disabled performers from non-western backgrounds.
She draws our attention to issues facing art performance for :
1- Acknowledging further catering and service needed for disabled artists and audience alike for the venues provided.
2- Highlighting the mental health importance, specially of performing artists specially those with disabilities.
3- Understanding the lack of treatment and pain severity, particularly for brown women with non-western background. Partly also for their lack of knowledge of healthcare system (not been fully informed of existing services) .
How Could you Apply the Resources to your own teaching?
It makes me conscious of International students studying with us at LCF and in case they need to be guided to right channels to seek appropriate help with appropriate professional guidance in order to get support with their education or employment.
How could you integrate this research into your own practice? Cite and example:
The mental health issue was massively highlighted during pandemic with International body of our students and it was of utmost important to slow the teaching tone and be more empathetic towards our students, who happen to live miles away from their families and felt trapped either in a oreign country momentarily / went home but felt detached from their studies.
27th June 2022 @ 10:03 am
Hello Shahpar,
I really enjoy how you have summarised some of the ideas Khairani Barokka discusses in her article. You touch on very important points regarding mental health for people with disabilities, and it would have been great to expand on this further.
I have been thinking about my position as an educator and how I can be well equipped to prepare the learning space for people with disabilities. I have been thinking of this in terms of the lengths of the sessions, the position and posture students are invited to take in the classroom, etc… so allowing more breaks, inviting students to walk across the classroom and back to their seats, stretch their bodies, my awareness/ attentiveness to mental health for students, etc.
You also make an excellent point about signposting students to the right channels. If you are interested and have the capacity, I have recently signed up for a short course available for UAL staff on core principles in disability, happening in July.
Looking forward to reading the rest of your blogs 🙂
22nd July 2022 @ 5:13 pm
Hi Shahpar,
Your take on Deaf Accessibility of Spoonies addresses the issue’s framed by the intersection of disability and gender and the intersection of disability and race. It has been an insightful read and I have enjoyed how you have looked at this through the lens of mental health.
I agree with you that our awareness regarding the mental health of our students is at the forefront since the pandemic. Being an ‘invisible disability’… it is more important than ever that we as educators know how to advise and support students living with mental health. Taking action, I did a bit of research on Canvas and was pleasantly surprised to see that CCW are hosting ‘Mental Health First Aider’ training for staff development.
Please see further info here should you be interested in attending (I have been in contact and more dates are to follow than just the 4th March that is advertised in the link)… https://canvas.arts.ac.uk/News/98655/mental-health-first-aid-training-at-ccw
On another note, I noticed your acknowledgement regarding students’ mental health and the importance “to slow the teaching tone”… have you thought about reading The Slow Professor: Challenging the Culture and Speed in the Academy by Maggie Berg and Barbara K. Seeber? I think you would find it of relevance and an interesting read.
29th July 2022 @ 2:39 pm
Many thanks Abigail. That will be on my reading list. So kind to reflect and respond on my blogs. So happy to have you as classmate.