Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic

Part of: Society for Historical Archaeology 2021

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic," at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The COVID-19 pandemic has made many archaeologists increasingly aware of the effects of health and ability on life in the past and present. Archaeologists have shown a growing appreciation for the ways that gender, class, ethnicity, and other aspects of identity intersect to create a tapestry of rich and varied lived experiences. Despite this increased attention to identity and oppression, the ways we practice archaeology in the present and the stories we tell about the past often assume a nondisabled perspective. This session examines how people dealt with health issues and epidemics in the past. Because we acknowledge that our current perspectives inform how we discuss subjects, we include critiques, explorations, and studies of how ableism distorts archaeological interpretation and limits the diversity of our profession. By using disability studies to engage with ideas about health and wellbeing, we can build a more inclusive archaeology in the present and future.

Other Keywords
disability • Bottles • Medicine • Disease • Narrative • Consumption • Identity • Hospital • Healthcare • Accessibility

Geographic Keywords
California • Europe • Central Illinois • Pacific Northwest, United States of America

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-6 of 6)

  • Documents (6)
Documents
  • Air As Therapy: Open-Air Treatment For Mental And Physical Disease 1890-1914 (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Gillian A Allmond.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. In May 2020, Professor Alan Penn of the British Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) told MPs that ‘science suggests that being outside in sunlight, with good ventilation, are both highly protective against transmission of the [corona]virus.’ Present-day medical researchers are not the first to link fresh...

  • Archaeology, Disability, and Healthcare Systems in California (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Alyssa Rose Scott.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The Covid-19 pandemic has brought greater awareness to the relationship between identity and healthcare systems. Processes of identification have long been an important topic of study within archaeology, but while archaeologists often consider the intersection between race, gender, class, and other facets of identity, they fail to...

  • Flexibility, Resilience, and Universal Design: Learning from the Experiences of Disabled Archaeologists (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Laura E. Heath-Stout.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Scholar-activists have been critiquing equity issues around gender, race, sexuality, and socioeconomic inequality for the past several decades. With few exceptions, however, this literature rarely addresses disability and accessibility issues. In this paper, I explore the experiences of academic archaeologists with disabilities,...

  • Investigating Choices: The Changing Medicinal Assemblage of the Carpenter Street Site in Springfield, Illinois (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Emma L Verstraete.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Over time out society has changed and evolved what is seen as ‘sick’ and what can be seen as a ‘cure’. This paper seeks to examine the health and hygiene assemblage at the Carpenter Street site, an excavation site in Springfield, Illinois. The site was used in a historic context for the initial settlement of Portuguese immigrants,...

  • A Peculiar Fitness: Occupation, Health, and Ability at a 20th-century Psychiatric Hospital (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Linnea Z Kuglitsch.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Archaeological studies into disability in the past often on the physical fabric of the body—sometimes, to the exclusion of the social and emotional dimensions of living with it. This paper examines the tensions between ability, health, and work among attendants ( nurses) at the Western Washington Hospital for the Insane at the turn...

  • What Can A Pandemic Offer Disabled People?: Vulnerable Subjects, Crip Community, And Archaeological Narrative (2021)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Katherine M Kinkopf.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "Disability Wisdom for the Covid-19 Pandemic" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted that Disabled people are not specially adapted to pandemic lifestyles, and in fact are disproportionately at risk in the contemporary pandemic landscape. In medieval Europe, broadly, a series of Yersinia (Black Death) infections transformed the social landscape. Prior to the Black Death,...