The Rushton Lecture is an integral annual event in the DaDa calendar. Held on 3rd December, the International Day of People with Disabilities, each year we bring a fresh keynote exploring topics pertinent to arts and disbility.
From it’s debut on Sunday 22 November 2015 where we commemorated the 201st anniversary of Edward Rushton’s death to our forthcoming 2024 lecture as part of DaDa’s 40th birthday celebrations, our Rushton Lecture has presented challenging talks from a diverse range of disabled activists.
From Actor and Activist Liz Carr speaking about ‘Death, disability and issues around Assisted Suicide’, something that later inspired her BBC documentary, to our most recent lecture where Ashok Mistry explored ‘Reclaiming Nonchalance’interrogating how Deaf Disabled and Neurodivergent artists are valued, our Edward Rushton lecture seeks to challenge perceptions, ask leading questions and move towards social change for disabled people.
You can find out more about our previous lectures and find links to watch or read more below.
Who was Edward Rushton?
Edward Rushton was a British poet, writer and bookseller from Liverpool who opened a school for the blind after losing his own vision. As a young man he worked as a sailor aboard a slave ship, and became an abolitionist as a result.
Rushton’s first poem, The Dismembered Empire, published in 1782 criticised British rulers using the framework of the American War. Rushton also wrote letters to his heroes George Washington and Thomas Paine to ask why they were not using their public influence to oppose slavery, but neither man replied.
It is this passion, activism and drive for social justice that is reflected and celebrated in our Edward Rushton lectures today.
2023 ‘Reclaiming Nonchalance’
Reclaiming Nonchalance is an invitation to activate ambition through the self-care of actively thinking beyond other people’s expectations. The lecture will dissect artworld mechanics and interrogate how Deaf Disabled and Neurodivergent artists are valued.
“We don’t want to have to be activists - however, it's existential - instead, do we not want disabled artists to be able to make art that doesn’t exist to be worthy but ploughs its own course and the nonchalance of its substance is taken at face value”.
Presented be Ashokkumar Mistry, a Leicester-based, Neurodivergent multidisciplinary artist, writer, researcher, activist & curator working in the UK and internationally. Subverting technologies and ideologies, he challenges conventional ways of making & viewing art.
Expert panellists included Kai Syng Tan (Artist / Agitator / Professor), Sonia Boué (Artist / Writer / Consultant) and Dr Linzi Stauvers (Acting Artistic Director, Education, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham) who also join a discussion led by DaDa’s Ngozi Ugochukwu to dive deep into the topic.
Slides from the lecture can be downloaded here:
https://issuu.com/dadafest10/docs/edward_rushton_social_justice_lecture_2023.pptx
A text only file of Ashok’s lecture can be downloaded here:
https://jmp.sh/s/ECNJ6gXh4UMqnOr1D5Yl
Watch the full event with BSL and subtitles here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsYRLTkusAc
2022 ‘Towards the Bodymind As Un-Colony’
In 2022 our Rushton lecture was delivered by writer and artist, Khairani Barokka.
Khairani's lecture was titled "Towards the Bodymind As Un-Colony" and was followed by a panel discussion involving artists and activists from the North West.
The bodyminds of all of us in the UK, and of so many billions beyond, are shaped by processes of colonial extractivism—so many of us texting with, eating, moisturising, bathing with, and being furnished by materials procured via unjust, ableist, and genocidal practices. These realities are as vicious and violent as the ‘official’ heyday of British empire, and are too seldom covered adequately in western media. How do we disentangle ourselves from these processes, and how is disability justice (a term coined by Sins Invalid) fundamental to socio-environmental salvation? How do we angle our bodyminds, everywhere, towards anticolonial solidarities, and, very importantly, with joy?
The panel discussion was chaired by Manchester based interdisciplinary artist Ngozi Ugochukwu, joined by Khairani Barokka and Liverpool based artists / activists Amina Atiq and Rachel Gnagniko.
About Khairani Barokka:
Khairani Barokka is a writer and artist from Jakarta, and Editor of Modern Poetry in Translation, whose work has been presented widely internationally, and aims to centre disability justice as anticolonial praxis. Her book Ultimatum Orangutan (Nine Arches), was shortlisted for the Barbellion Prize.
A transcript of this lecture 'The Bodymind as Un-colony' from December 2022 can be viewed via the link below along with video:
2020 ‘The Language of Disability’
DaDa welcomed Deborah Williams as key note speaker and host of our 2020 lecture which examined how the use of language and its associated interpretations impact on how disabled people self-define and on the perception of disabled people within society. In particular, the lecture examined and explored how the language being used during the pandemic served to reinforce the negative perception of disabled people, particularly women, by society.
The key note speech was followed by a webinar discussion chaired by Paula Garfield, Artistic Director at Deafinitely Theatre. For the discussion Deborah was joined by Ono Dafedjaiye from award-winning creative arts company Heart n Soul and Marie Tidball, Research Associate in Law at Wadham College Oxford.
The event was being live streamed in partnership with Something To Aim For.
Read more about this event here: https://www.dadafest.co.uk/event/the-edward-rushton-lecture-the-language-of-disability
2019 ‘Disabled Women in Arts and Culture: Who’s Calling the Shots?’
Theatre maker and Associate Director for Graeae Theatre Company, Nickie Miles-Wildin was our keynote speaker and host for this event, looking at the representation of disabled women in the arts sector.
With a lively panel discussion chaired by Dr Erin Pritchard, lecturer at Liverpool Hope University in the department of Disability and Education, panellists artist Jackie Hagan, Bethany Murray and Tammy Reynolds interrogated this theme further, looking at how stereotypical portrayals of disabled women affect our perception of disabled women in reality.
View the event over on youtube:
https://youtu.be/xuRXMF8tYIk
2018 ‘The Impact of Becoming Disabled’
Simon Weston CBE delivered our 2018 lecture. When serving in the Falklands conflict he sustained life changing injuries and become a person who decided to use his experiences to educate and motive others to achieve.
Weston’s lecture focussed on the impact of becoming disabled after armed service.
Disability is fraught with many layers of misunderstanding and stereotypes that can lead to negative or unrealistic expectations on the person and their families and friends. How does a physically fit soldier, airperson or sailor deal with a life that is now changed? What is the impact on family and social life? How can you deal with people’s comments and attitudes?
Simon delivered insight into these issues followed by a debate and Q & A with ex-service personnel.
2017 ‘Disability Rights: Activism, Direct Action & the Continual Fight for Equality’
Our keynote in 2017 was delivered by Jackie Driver Chair of Sign Health, CEO at Breakthrough UK, Principal Officer at the Equality and Human Rights Commission at the time.
Jackie’s talk was on ‘Disability Rights: Activism, Direct Action & the Continual Fight for Equality’.
Jackie commented that the theme was “transformation towards sustainable and resilient society for all” focussing enabling conditions for the transformation of changes and the continued fight for equality. Jackie says “Deaf and disabled people are sick of having their bandwidths reduced to resolving barriers".
The event was hosted by Councillor Pam Thomas with Lord Mayor Councillor Malcom Kennedy offering a welcome.
A panel discussion followed including panel members Dennis Queen, Dr Janet Price, Evelyn Asante-Mensah and Jackie Driver chaired by Pam Thomas.
View the 2017 Lecture over on youtube here:
https://youtu.be/sR5ne4Jv1H8
View the panel discussion over on youtube here:
https://youtu.be/3f45vTDzPF4
2016 ‘Death, disability and issues around Assisted Suicide’
Aligned with Transgender Memorial Day and continuing the rebellious spirit of forgotten hero, Edward Rushton, the annual Social Justice Lecture aims to instigate change and eradicate the barriers many disabled people still face.
Disability Activist and Actor Liz Carr spoke on death, disability and issues around Assisted Suicide.
The lecture focussed on investigating the barriers that still exist within disabled peoples’ lives and what needs to be done by decision makers to radically change the current position.
In 2024 Liz Carr went on to record a BBC Documentary exploring the topic of assisted suicide further called ‘Better Off Dead?’ which can be viewed on BBC i-player here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001z8wc
2015 ‘Rushton’s Life and the Role and Voice of Influential Disabled People and Their Organisations’
On Sunday 22 November 2015, DaDa hosted the first Rushton Social Justice Lecture at Liverpool Town Hall hosted by Roger Philips (BBC Radio Merseyside). The event commemorated the 201st anniversary of Edward Rushton’s death and followed on from our celebrations of Rushton’s life the previous year as part of DaDaFest International 2014 and was a great way to start Disability History Month.
You can download the lectures by Steve Binns MBE & Miro Griffiths MBE, below:
Transcripts from the Q & A session that followed are also available below: