Hollywood has been using disabled characters in movies for over 100 years. Yet, it’s only in the past 20 years that disability culture activists have been thinking seriously about how these films are shaping the way the public sees disability, as well as how disabled people see themselves.

Join the University of Illinois for the fourth salon in the program series Hollywood Images of Disability. With film clips of movies and a guided discussion with the audience, Hollywood Images of Disability offers a rare opportunity to discuss intersections of race and disability as it encourages critical thinking about mass media representations of race and disability in film.

This event will feature clips from movies such as: Home of the Brave, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Bone Collector, The Soloist, The Green Mile and more.

The discussion will consider the following:

• How do disability, race and gender imagery work together toward forwarding a white liberal political agenda during the civil rights era and today?
• What are the pitfalls of these representations?
• Do they contribute to or detract form social change?

Hollywood Images of Disability is presented in partnership with the University of Illinois at Chicago, Body of Works, Beyondmedia Education, Luminist Films, and First United Methodist Church. This program is made possible in part by a grant from the Illinois Humanities Council, The National Endowment for the Humanities and the Illinois General Assembly.

For more information, please contact Carrie Sandahl at (312) 996-1967 or Theresa Pacione at (773) 946-7540.