I'm excited to see this, the first 'poetry course run by Arvon tutored by, and for, D/deaf, disabled and neurodiverse poets.' The question that needs to be asked now is, why did it take this long?

arvon.org/writing-course…
Arvon celebrated their 50th anniversary in 2018. Don't get me wrong, I'm excited to see this course, but I can't help but wonder why Arvon have suddenly acknowledged the existence of disabled writers, after ignoring them for over half a lifetime?
The bitter irony of Arvon running their first course for disabled writers is that if the pandemic wasn't going on, a majority of disabled people literally wouldn't be able to get their foot in the door of Arvon's three writing centres, because they're...less than accessible.
And even with a PiP concession, the course for disabled writers is still £140, a price tag that will exclude more disabled writers than it includes. If Arvon are going to start thinking about disabled writers, go all the way. Make your buildings and your infrastructure accessible
If you're going to include disabled writers after fifty years of ignoring us, go all the way. Make your writing centres accessible. Offer higher concessions or more free places, or both. Think about how your infrastructure has excluded disabled writers, and continues to do so.
If Arvon is serious about including disabled writers, then they need to make a commitment to accessibility. Arvon needs to think about who they exclude by having inaccessible writing centres and by offering so few free or concessionary places.
If Arvon has any plans to make this course the first of many that centres disabled writers, then they need to deeply interrogate how their practises as an organisation exclude the very disabled writers they're trying (and failing) to reach.

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Karl Knights

Karl Knights Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @Inadarkwood

18 Jan
The UK has the highest Covid death rate in the world, a third of deaths are disabled people, and GPs are phoning disabled people and the parents of disabled children to urge them to sign DNRs. Disabled people in the UK are not okay right now. Check in on your disabled friends.
For ten damn years, the Tories have been hammering disabled people in the UK. The UN said the Tories had engineered 'a human catastrophe' by their austerity measures. My friends are fucking dead because of the Tories, and now the Tories are killing thousands by proxy every day.
People have no idea how bad things were here BEFORE Covid. And now they're so much worse, which I hoped wouldn't be possible. Words can't touch how profoundly angry and sad I am. And I have no doubt that thousands of disabled people are feeling it, too.
Read 5 tweets
18 Jan
Update on the search for disabled poets writing for children: still a whole lot of nothing, a lot of brick walls. But I'll keep up the search.
An NT absolutely would have given up weeks ago
What's become apparent though, is that poetry is majorly lagging behind other genres. I can find disabled authors in picture books, Middle Grade novels and YA - not loads by any means, but a fair few. But there's almost nothing for poetry. Why has children's poetry lagged behind?
Read 5 tweets
17 Jan
Here's your weekly reminder that the #LGBTQIAonTwitter includes many disabled people like moi. 💋💅🏼 ♿️🌈🏳️‍🌈#GaybourhoodBaddies Karl, a white man with glas...Karl, a person with short b...
Alt text just in case Twitter's Alt-text doesn't work.

Image 1: Karl, a white man with glasses, short brown hair and red lipstick, doing a toothy smile directly into the camera. A cane is hanging off his shoulder, and he's wearing a vest which says 'Venice.'
Image 2: Karl looking directly into the camera with a plain expression. He's wearing glasses, has short brown hair and red lipstick. He's wearing a beige jumper with a red collar poking out of the neck.
Read 7 tweets
17 Jan
You know, the ableds often look at me suspiciously when I say disabled people's lives have been valued as less than in the pandemic. Well, here's it is, in black and white. Lord Sumption saying on the bloody BBC that disabled lives are 'less valuable.'
That's how mainstream and accepted rampant ableism is. There it is, on the BBC, for all to see. Meanwhile disabled people have been asked by their GPs to sign DNR's. Disabled people are tired, folks.
Here is a transcript of the video, as there's no captions:
Read 5 tweets
17 Jan
How much time have we got? I could go on for DAYS about horrible, ableist teachers.
Here are the two things I always think about when people ask about horrible teachers.

Number one:
Number two. I've tweeted about this one before, but frankly it's so puzzling and weird, it deserves several tweets.

Read 7 tweets
17 Jan
Someone please recommend me a writing craft book that isn't another white straight abled dude holding forth on all they know about writing. I can find absolutely ZERO diversity of any kind in the craft/how to write genre. 😩
I can find a fair few essays, but absolutely no books
This tweet was brought to you by the craft book I read over Christmas where not a single page worth of advice applied to disabled writers at all. And this is so common, not only in craft books, but in creative writing courses, too.
Read 6 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!