Louise Townson and I attended a conference in Milton Keynes on the 1st and 2nd July. The conference was run by the Open University Social History of Learning Disabilities group. You can find out more about the conference if you click here.
The conference was really interesting. The theme this year was about ‘Staff Stories and stories about Staff’. Some of the people who spoke were staff, talking about their experiences, and some people were there to talk about their staff, now and in the past.
There were a few different presentations about staff in institutions (places like long stay hospitals, such as Dovenby Hall and Calderstones) in the past. They talked about how there was never any time to help people the way they would like, and about how they felt about that. It was really nice to hear them talk honestly about their past, which must have been very hard for some people.
I really enjoyed Sue Dumbleton’s presentation about ’Staff as liberators: liberation from what?’ and Karrie Marshalls presentaion. Karrie had brought a big exhibition with her about a place she had researched in Scotland called New Craigs.
Part of being at conferences is about meeting new people, and I was very lucky to meet Eyglo Ebba Hreinsdottir and her husband Jony. I spoke with Ebba about women in Iceland being sterilised without their knowledge. Ebba thinks it is very important to keep history alive by talking about it. I think this is very true. Ebba is a very powerful woman!
Allan's book - it's really good!
We had dinner with Allan Mayer, who wrote a fabulous book called ‘Tasting the Wind’ which is about his experiences of being invoved in helping people move into the community from a large hospital in the 1980’s. I’ll recommend Allan’s book, which you can buy by clicking here.
On the presentations which stood out the most to me were the ones about very old History, becasue I am very interested in history. One man, Simon Jarret talked about how people have changed their attitudes to people who are labelled with Learning difficulties over time in the courts system. I found this fascinating, and look forwards to hearing more from Simon about his research.
Here’s to next year!
By Chloe Brownlee-Chapman