Karen Nakamura: August 2006 Archives

In random googling of the net, I came across the Disability History Association. I've never heard of them, but they going to have their 121st annual meeting, so they must have been around for a while. Interesting sections of their website include their Teaching Resources and recent publications.

This question came in as a comment to an older blog entry:

How do you choose which school to apply to? I've heard conflicting advice (choose the school based on the faculty member you want to work with [be willing to take Michigan over Harvard], go for the name [Yale over Berkeley, for example], etc, etc)

Posted by: mac at May 31, 2005 3:09 AM

I thought I'd repost the response as a separate entry as it might get otherwise missed and some applicants have been asking me similar questions recently. It's been slightly edited.

I've recently gotten several e-mails from people interested in graduate programs in Deaf Studies or Disability Studies within Anthropology. I've come up with the following list to help people narrow down their choice of schools. It's still very tentative and I would greatly appreciate feedback from people who know of other programs.

Note that for the most part I have only listed places where there are faculty active in Deaf Studies or Disability Studies. However, most of us are first generation scholars -- we received our PhDs at programs where there was nobody who focused in Deaf culture or disability. I do not think we are yet at the second generation of scholarship yet -- where people will be studying more or less in specialized programs. Thus, you should not narrow your focus to only the programs listed, but also look for programs that are strong either in your areal speciality (geographic region) or topical speciality (such as language ideology; biomedicine and social institutions; etc.). You can always ask one of the people listed below to serve as an external committee member or dissertation reader.

I just finished printing out 50 of my disability-protest photographs for a small show that I'm opening at the main Yale library. More on the show later. I used my Epson Stylus Pro 1280 printer. It's an older model -- but still on the Epson books, as it's very popular among photographers for its pigmentdye-based inks.

I usually print on Matte Paper Heavyweight. I've tried a variety of different papers types and styles and have always returned to the matte paper. It reminds me of the old fiber papers when I used to use the darkroom. The blacks are deep and luscious and it especially gives my film-based photography the softer look that I like.

While waiting for my printer to print, I was struck by two sentiments. One is the ease of color photography now that we have digital printers. I had always worked in a darkroom, but never with color because of the steep learning curve and expensive equipment necessary. Photography has also become much more affordable. The cost of printing out 50 photographs came out to around $75 -- the new ink cartridges just barely made it through the batch -- or around $1.50 per 8x10 photograph.

There's a wonderful review of Norwegian anthropologist Jan-Kåre Breivik's new book Deaf Identities in the Making. Local Lives, Transnational Connections on the Anthropologi.info blog.

Posted on Kansai Time Out: Talk with the Hand: the State of Japanese Sign Language

Suzanne Kamata examines the state of Japanese sign language

On a typical spring morning, ten children, ranging in age from 3 to 6 gather in the kindergarten playroom at the Tokushima School for the Deaf. The teacher waits till she has everyones attention, sometimes calling out a name, and the morning song begins. Sensei, ohayo! Minna-san ohayo! (Good morning, teacher! Good morning, everyone!)

Read more...

I'm back from my six week tour in China and am resting/recuperating in Osaka for a few days before heading to the United States. Sorry for the long period of inactivity on this blog, I'll try to catch up with postings ASAP!