Disability Studies MA

New Beginnings in Culture and Disability Studies:
A Multiple Launch Event

5 June, 2026, Liverpool Hope University

10am-4.30pm, EDEN Arbour Room, EDEN Building, Childwall Campus

The Centre for Culture and Disability Studies (CCDS) invites you to attend the 2026 multiple launch event.

This year marks new beginnings for Dr Saul Leslie’s debut novel, A Working Title I Want to Change, and Dr Liam Owens’s Disability Sport MA, as well as Prof David Bolt’s monograph, The Playground Model of Disability; edited volume, Cultural Stations of Disability; and The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Disability Studies.

There will be a dozen presentations across the day, including CCDS core members Dr Erin Pritchard, Dr Leah Burch, and Dr Emma Swai; senior colleagues such as our Vice Chancellor, Prof Penny Haughan; and Pro Vice-Chancellor, Prof Atulya Nagar; and special guests Dr Owen Barden (Trinity College Dublin), Dr Maryam Farahani (University of Liverpool), Dr Felipe Moreira (University of Leicester), Dr Alison Wilde (Northumbria University), and Dr Nina Michelle Worthington (Canterbury Church Christ University).

To attend this free event it is necessary to book via our online store:
https://store.hope.ac.uk/product-catalogue/faculty-of-education-and-social-sciences/school-of-social-sciences/events/new-beginnings-in-culture-and-disability-studies-a-multiple-launch-event

This is a face-to-face event but we hope to record and share it via the CCDS YouTube Channel:
https://www.youtube.com/

New Beginnings in Culture and Disability Studies:
A Multiple Launch Event

Centre for Culture and Disability Studies, Liverpool Hope University

EDEN Arbour Room/Lounge, EDEN Building, Childwall Campus, L16 9JD

5 June, 2026

10am Welcome from the Pro Vice-Chancellor, Prof Atulya Nagar

10.15 Monograph Launch, Prof David Bolt, introduced by Dr Ana Bê Pereira
The Playground Model of Disability: Dis/Honesty Tropes in Contemporary British Sociocultural Representation

11-11.15 Refreshments

11.15 Course Launch, Dr Liam Owens
Disability Sport MA

11.45 Volume Launch, Chaired by Dr Erin Pritchard
Cultural Stations of Disability: A Moment in Discourse
- Dr Emma Swai, A New Testament: Changing Positionality, Changing Interpretation
- Dr Maryam Farahani, Figure Skating Pace and Olympic Policy: The Problematics of Performance Normativity Cultures in Women’s Sport
- Dr Felipe Moreira, Dury and Dwoskin: Disabled Gazes and De-Normalised Sociocultural Archives
- Dr Erin Pritchard, Cultural Stations of Dwarfism: From Little Helpers to Burney Nesbitt

1pm Lunch (not provided)

2pm Novel Launch, Dr Saul Leslie, introduced by Head of Humanities, Prof Stephen Kelly
A Working Title I Want to Change

2.45 Refreshments

3-4.15 Encyclopedia Launch, Chaired by Dr Leah Burch
Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Disability Studies
- Dr Alison Wilde, Disability and Activism
- Dr Owen Barden, Participatory Historical Research with People with Learning Disabilities
- Dr Nina Michelle Worthington, How Disability Engages UK Theatre Practice
- Dr Leah Burch, Disability and Hate

4.15-4.30 Reflections from the Vice Chancellor, Prof Penny Haughan