How To Be Disabled in a Pandemic: A Disability Pride Panel in Collaboration with the NYU Center for Disability Studies

Tuesday, July 22, 2025, 6 – 7:30 PM
Andrew Heiskell Braille and Talking Book Library
40 West 20th Street
New York, NY 10011

As part of Disability Pride Month, essayists Aiyuba Thomas, Chancey Fleet, and Harris Kornstein, all featured in a new book, How to be Disabled in a Pandemic , discuss their experiences with disability in New York City during the Covid-19 lockdown. This program is a collaboration between the New York Public Library and the NYU Center for Disability Studies.

To join the event online | Please register for an Online Ticket. This event will be streamed on Zoom. To receive a Zoom link, please be sure to register! The link will be shared with registrants shortly before start time.

American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation will be provided for this event. Real-time CART (Communication Access Real-Time Translation) captioning will be provided for this event.

More Information and Registration

ABOUT THE PANELISTS:

Aiyuba Thomas is an MA graduate from NYU-GALLATIN School of Individualized Study, where he concentrated in Social Entrepreneurship. He is a justice-impacted researcher and activist dedicated to addressing issues that impact marginalized communities, especially those affected by mass incarceration. Aiyuba is an alumnus of Columbia JIE and NYU PEP. He is the founder of “The Association” a NYU student organization created to provide on and off campus support for those affected by the INJUSTICE system. Aiyuba co-authored “Abolition Labor,” offering insights and a national inquiry into prison labor, and “How To Be Disabled in a Pandemic,” a collaborative work with NYU’s Center for Disability.

As a skilled investigator, Aiyuba has conducted nearly 200 ethnographic and oral history interviews with formerly incarcerated individuals/groups, their families, supporters, lawyers, politicians, and social change activists. These interviews have led to several publications and have been featured on various multimedia platforms. Most recently, Aiyuba served as the Project Manager for “Movements Against Mass Incarceration,” an archival oral history project that aims to span the nation.

In addition to his research work, Aiyuba is deeply involved in advocacy, education, and mentorship. He tirelessly works to bring about positive change and support those affected by incarceration.

Chancey Fleet is a Blind tech educator and activist based in Brooklyn. She is the founding Assistive Technology Coordinator at the New York Public Library, where she runs a free- peer-powered tech coaching service that connects library patrons with print-reading disabilities to 150 hours of one-to-one coaching each month; curates a rotating selection of workshops on tech topics with accessibility in mind; and runs the Dimensions Lab for free and open tactile graphics creation. Chancey is a 2017 Library Journal Mover and Shaker. She serves as President of the National Federation of the Blind’s Assistive Technology Trainers’ Division. Check out Chancey’s library at: talkingbooks.nypl.org

Harris Kornstein is a scholar and artist whose work focuses on queer play through contemporary technologies and digital cultures, media art/activism, and disability and queer/trans studies. Their current book project considers what we might learn from drag performers to creatively counter many of the harms of digital technologies, through playful techniques of misuse, obfuscation, and reinvention. They also co-edited the anthology How to Be Disabled in a Pandemic (NYU Press, forthcoming February 2025) analyzing the experiences of disabled New Yorkers during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. Harris’s research has been published in journals like Surveillance & Society and Curriculum Inquiry, alongside several edited volumes such as Queer Data Studies, and their essays have appeared in publications like The Guardian, Wired, and Salon. Additionally, their research has been supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship. Harris is currently Assistant Professor of Public & Applied Humanities at the University of Arizona and earned a PhD in Media, Culture & Communication from NYU and an MFA in Digital Arts & New Media from UC Santa Cruz.

ABOUT THE MODERATOR

Quemuel Arroyo joined the MTA in February 2021 as the organization’s first agencywide Chief Accessibility Officer. In this capacity, Arroyo leads the implementation of policies, initiatives, and programs that advance accessibility throughout the organization.

Prior to joining the MTA, Arroyo served as Interim President and Global Head of Community at Charge, an e-scooter charging and docking company. Before Charge, he served as the first Chief Accessibility Specialist at the New York City Department of Transportation, where he helped settle the largest accessibility claim in the nation.