Disability Month 2018

Celebrating UK Disability History Month 2018

Disability brings a new perspective to creativity. The 2018 Disability History Month focuses on the connections between disability and music. Iconic singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell once explained her unusual guitar chord technique was as the result of her attenuated muscularity. These were not seen as a limitation, but as a prized original sound.

UK Disability History Month (UKDHM) runs every year, organising a series of events that focus on thepath to equality and human rights for all disabled persons. This year, the organisers want to explore the links between the experience of disablement in a world where the barriers people with impairments face can be overwhelming.

UK Disability History Month

Event planners this year want to make people think about how the creative impulse and urge for self-expression. The message they’re trying to share is that the need to connect to our fellow human beings often ‘trumps’ the oppression disabled people have faced, do face and will face in the future.

Disability History Month in 2018 runs from 22nd November to 22nd December. This is an important time of the year to considered the issues of disabled persons, encompassing HIV/AIDS Day (1 December), International Day of People with Disabilities (3 December) and International Human Rights Day (10 December). December also brings Anti-Bullying Week (19-23 November), an often under-discussed issue for disabled children and young people.

Disability activism

The reason for the month of events is to highlight how people with every type and degree of impairment can creatively express themselves. In music, and in work, disabled persons face barriers to progress. We want to challenge that. Search our jobs database today.

Events this year include:

• Manchester Disability History Rocks! 3 December 2018, 12-4.30pm. This is a free showcase of music and creativity by disabled artists and activists from Manchester at the Manchester Central Library, ground floorperformance space.
• Penny Pepper at the Albert Hall, 17 December 21.30. This is a late-night Christmas special of That’s What She Said, a night of spoken word featuring the most incendiary, intoxicating women writers and performers around. It showcases the best new writing and performance by women, featuring established and emerging authors with a mix of performance, poetry, storytelling, slam and more.
• Inclusive Societies, Accessible Workplaces: Disabled People in the Public and Private Sphere, 3rd December 2018, 13:00- 14:00, D/L006, Derwent College/York University. This original seminar will consider disability and the workplace, and how to shape it for the future.

Disability Confident scheme

We’re celebrating this month as we share the belief that disability should be looked at through the lenses of ability, not limitation. We were recently awarded the highest level of government recognition for our leadership in attracting, recruiting, retaining and promoting persons with disabilities.

We hold level three status in the ‘Disability Confident’ scheme. This is a government programme that lets businesses talk to other businesses about their efforts to encourage quality employment for It uses simple activities and processes to have companies look at how they work and what they do, focusing on internal improvement and outward advocacy on disability issues. We take this commitment with us as we talk to people, and businesses, about equality and diversity in the workplace. Search our jobs database of inclusive employers today.

Positive action on disability

The scheme helps companies to move from simple audits to find improvements to their working practices, to self-assessment and consideration of how they practically support disabled people into work. The third level and highest level requires outside review of a company’s disability-confident working practices. Companies must also prove they are leading the way to educate others in good practice.

The Disability Confident scheme is part of a Government commitment to get one million more disabled people into work within the next ten years. It started in November 2016 and by 2018 there were 6,500employerssigned up. It replaces the Disability Symbol ‘Two Ticks’ scheme.

Jobs for persons with disabilities

We’re proud to be advocating for the ideas and principles of UK disability history month. We’re always interested in ideas and situations that improve the situation of persons with disabilities - search your next job with us here. We work with disability-friendly businesses that have a proven track record when it comes to hiring disabled workers. When you search with us you can apply with the confidence that your application will be taken seriously.Search our jobs database today.