Happy National Canadian Film Day
Here is the link for Back to God's Country and the recorded interview I held with Christina Stewart, Tom McSorley, and Piers Handling on the importance of Canada's film archives. It'll be available for 48 hours.
Happy watching!
watch.canfilmday.ca/landing/3778...
Flight prices to the UK from Canada have increased by over 33%, so the flight alone would have been $2300. I wasn't able to generate enough workshop interest to be able to pay for the trip. That's one unfortunate side of working freelance is that there is no institutional financial support.
I, unfortunately, have to cancel my presentation "Another example of FOR us but not BY us?: Disabled participation in the development of AI archival technology” at ARA later this year in Glasgow due to cost.
"Never forget" has lost most of its meaning in a time of distorted cultural amnesia. "Are you ok?" means public execution in 2026.
Will our virtual words be saved for future generations to read and study? Only time will tell for certain. If they are saved, however, please pay attention.
I had a great time leading a virtual archival accessibility workshop with staff at The London Archives this morning. It's always interesting hosting workshops internationally because it gives you a sense of the similarities and differences versus here in Canada.
@synoptiquejournal.bsky.social just published its special issue on "Teaching Media Archives." Included is my article "Supporting the 36%: A Teaching Guide on Student Mental Health in Media Archival Education." Mental health awareness is crucial for those in archival managerial and educator roles.
My workshops have been hosted in multiple different countries with government archives, museums, medical collections, film archives, non-profits, archival professional organizations, universities, and more. Send me a message here or my email marlattmphd(at)gmail.com if interested.
Currently accepting virtual bookings for my archive and museum accessibility workshops from November-March. Inperson will begin again in the spring. Spots are filling up quickly.
Sitting in Heathrow waiting for my morning flight home. I had a great time here in the UK presenting at ARA @araukie.bsky.social and hosting workshops with the Imperial War Museum and the Wellcome Collection @wellcomecollection.bsky.social. I hope to make it back again at some point in 2026!
Note: You do not get to dictate how I describe myself in my own bio. Identity-first language is a personal choice and a very important one to me. I am proud of how my brain works because it makes me me. So please be respectful of how people refer to themselves.
I had a great archival accessibility talk today. Unfortunately, the organizers received an email complaint about the use of “disabled” vs “person with a disability” in my bio. I feel bad that they were put in an uncomfortable position but were wonderful about it.
I spoke about the films in a way that showed care and compassion for those on the screen from my own lived experience. I am now the Dr. when 100+ years ago I would have potentially been the one filmed. That honour is not lost on me. I hope I did them proud.
Thank you to the SCSMI conference for allowing me to screen part of these films. It’s very likely the first time in 120 years that someone who experiences the same seizures themselves has screened the films.
These films have been screened in medical schools, “freak shows”, and in avant-garde film circles in the 120 years since. They were gawked at and othered.
In 1905, Boston area doctor Dr. Walter G Chase filmed multiple people experiencing tonic-clonic seizures in a pretty inhumane way. These were individuals who were living at the Craig Colony for Epileptics in upstate New York at the time.
Please also join us for lunch on June 12th for the Film Bytes screening. It'll be a fun program of Canadian university-related films.
Please also feel free to say hello. I'm excited to hear what everyone else is up to.
On June 10th I'll be presenting "From Edmonton to Ottawa and Beyond: Disability Participation at the Annual ACA Conference." It'll be interesting presenting on the ACA conference while AT the ACA conference. How meta!
ACA is coming up fast. I am pulling triple duty this year.
The Sound and Moving Images Special Interest Section (S.M.I.S.I.S.) will be hosting a casual drop-in session on June 9th.
I had a great time yesterday with Association of Canadian Archivists hosting my Accessibility Strategies for a more Inclusive Canadian Archive workshop. It sold out in two days so I am setting time aside to host a couple more of my general archival accessibility workshops.
forms.gle/CatnkrPZEJzG...
I have unfortunately cancelled my upcoming SCMS 2025 conference presentation that was set for this April in Chicago. As I am Canadian I will likely not be travelling to the US for the foreseeable future.
I am hoping a book review can be included in the upcoming accessibility guest edited issue of the Moving Image. This could be a great opportunity for a graduate student to be published for the first time.
Publication announcement: Preserving Disability: Disability and the Archival Profession, edited by Gracen Brilmyer & Lydia Tang, an edited collection of 22 chapters on disability & the archival profession: featuring disabled archival users, disabled archivists, and archival labor on disability! Forward by Alice Wong. Black text with blue, red, yellow and pink hand drawn squiggles on a dark blue background.
People were asking about the release date of Preserving Disability during the AMIA Publishing panel. Turns out that it's today. Included is my chapter ""But Don't Those Cause You Seizures!?" Epilepsy Activism through Film Archiving."
lnkd.in/gnH6EDad
See you there!
Looks like I may have the wrong hashtag. #scms25
Excited that I will present at SCMS on the need for a global audiovisual archival disability network! #SCMS2025
Looking to host more archival accessibility workshops this winter if anyone is interested. I've hosted them previously with broadcast archives, government archives, universities, and professional organizations. Based on my own lived experience in the field with epilepsy and my dissertation work.
Since this is a new network I also wanted to share that we are still looking for submissions for a special upcoming issue of The Moving Image that is dedicated to Accessibility in Moving Image Archives. The submission deadline is November 30th.
amianet.org/wp-content/u...
