Spring 2010

Reversal: When the Therapist Becomes the Patient

Reversal Book Cover

Featuring: Eric Galvez, PT DPT CSCS Monday, March 22nd, 2010, 7:00  8:30 pm 5 Washington Place, Room 101 (Between Broadwday and Mercer Street)

Come hear the journey of a young active healthcare professional turned patient with a brain tumor and what he learned along the way.

Co-Sponsored By: NYU Doctor of Physical Therapy Students and the Council for the Study of Disability


The Disabilities Network of NYC and The NYU Council for the Study of Disability invite you to disThis!

Spring 2010
DisTHIS! Turns 4 with John Callahan’s QUADS!

Quads Book Cover

Wednesday, March 31st 6:30-9:30 19 University Place

From the warped imagination of quadriplegic cartoonist John Callahan comes QUADS! This darkly comic animated series tells the twisted tale of Reilly O’Reilly, a foul mouthed drinker who gets run over by a millionaire, becomes quadriplegic and preys upon the millionaires guilt — and fear of being sued — to score himself a mansion.

More disability gags per episode than three seasons of “Family Guy” and “South Park” combined, follow Reilly as he fills his mansion with people “less fortunate than himself.” Together the disabled anti-heroes form their own dysfunctional little family, the QUADS!

Never before seen in the United States, QUADS! gleefully skewers political correctness at every opportunity. Reilly’s housemates at “Maimed Manor” include the blind and black but-not-musical, Fontaine, the head-on-a-skateboard, Blazer, and the former masseur with hooks for hands, Lefty. Reilly also has a gay Australian physical therapist, Spalding; a hemp wearing, VW minibus-driving, environmentalist girlfriend, Franny and a belching, Irish barkeeper friend, Griz.

Go ahead, laugh. You know you want to…

The New York Times wrote about QUADS: “Callahan is either brilliant and savagely honest. Or he is sick.”

Cover your bets, folks, he’s both!

As a “special” birthday treat for the disTHIS! faithful, everyone who attends gets a chance to win their very own QUADS DVD! Don’t forget to RSVP!

For more information, go to: http://disthis.org To RSVP and reserve YOUR seat, call 212-284-4160 or email: disthis@dnnyc.net


Anthropology of Disability Film Festivals

Featuring: David Mitchell from the Institute on Disabilities at Temple University and Sharon Snyder from Brace Yourselves Productions Thursday, April 1st 4:00 to 6:00 pm Location: 20 Cooper Square, 4th floor

David Mitchell and Sharon Snyder

In this co-presentation, Mitchell and Snyder analyze the ideological, aesthetic, and pedagogical effects of disability film festivals. Mitchell and Snyder are particularly interested to explore the way such festivals, by screening an array of international films, manage to respond to newly evolving concepts of “being disabled” even as they resist articulating a shared identity based on collective coherence of experience, affect, or diagnosis.

This event is co-sponsored by the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, the Gender and Sexuality Studies Program in the Department of Social and Cultural Analysis, and the Disability Council.


Including Samuel

Featuring: Dan Habib and Richard Ellenson Friday, April 9th, 2010 1:00 pm to 3:00 pm 19 University Place

Samuel Film viewing and conversation between Dan Habib, film-maker and father of Samuel and Richard Ellenson the father of Thomas and the force behind the development of NYCs Manhattan School for Children (PS333) a K-8th Grade inclusion school. Richard Ellison is also known as the developer of TANGO a communication device that has enabled his son and others to be more fully included in their classrooms.

This is an exciting opportunity for these two men to share their experiences and address questions regarding inclusion as portrayed through the stories contained in Including Samuel and the experience of inclusive education in the New York City public schools.

Including Samuel: Photojournalist Dan Habib rarely thought about the inclusion of children with disabilities before he had his son Samuel 10 years ago. Now he thinks about inclusion every day. Habib documented his family’s efforts to include Samuel in every facet of their lives, a journey that transforms each of them.

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