A Step by Step Guide to Building Accessible Arts in California
A Step by Step Guide to Building Accessible Arts in California was designed by the NADC to assist the arts community as they make their space, programs, and activities available to approximately 5 million Californians with disabilities. Topics covered in this publication include: how the law applies to your organization, patrons, and audiences; conduct an ADA survey of your facility; adopt a policy statement about your organizations commitment to accessibility; train your staff; implement your ADA plan; and promote and advertise your accessibility.

Accessibility Planning and Resource Guide for Cultural Administrators
The National Arts and Disability Center at the University of California Los Angeles under contract and in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies produced this online companion to the printed text Design for Accessibility: A Cultural Administrator’s Handbook (2003). The Guide provides guidance to cultural administrators on how to achieve accessible and inclusive programming for everyone including individuals with disabilities and older adults. It is designed to help your organization not only comply with Section 504 and the Americans with Disabilities Act but also to assist in making access an integral part of your organization, including its staffing, mission, budget, education, meetings, programs and beyond. The Guide outlines a step-by-step "nuts and bolts" process for achieving accessible practices by setting the standard and illustrating how cultural organizations can make it happen. It features examples of “best practices” that illustrate specific methods for opening existing programs, services, facilities, and activities to individuals with disabilities and older adults, as artists, arts administrators, board members, volunteers, teachers, students and audience members. This online text takes advantage of Internet technology by presenting and linking to a wide variety of resources that assist cultural organizations. It is also provides necessary information to enable arts and humanities service organizations to assist their grantees/constituents in achieving accessible programming.

Assistive Listening Devices for People with Hearing Loss: A Guide for Performing Arts Settings.(PDF)
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts "This is a practical guide about accessible and universally usable facilities and performing arts programs."

Design for Accessibility: A Cultural Administrator's Handbook
This handbook represents an update of the Arts Endowment's The Arts and 504 (1992) with additional information from the 700-page Design for Accessibility: An Arts Administrator's Guide produced by the Arts Endowment and NASAA in 1994. This resource is designed to help you not only comply with Section 504 and the Americans with Disabilities Act, but to assist you in making access an integral part of your organization's planning, mission, programs, outreach, meetings, budget and staffing.

Designing Accessible Programs for Museums
This is an annotated bibliography on museum accessibility that includes a review of readably published information on guidelines for designing accessible services and programs; examples of model accessible programs and museums; disability related resources and materials; design resources such as exhibit design, signage, surveys; and studies conducted on museum accessibility.

Listening with an Open Eye
Listening with an Open Eye is intended to provide employers background and practical information with respect to working with Deaf and hard of hearing actors. It includes information about Deaf culture and American Sign Language; procedure and comportment for planning and executing a production, covering the arc of the audition, rehearsal and production process; and the role of the interpreter. In addition, related organizations are referenced.

Artwork
Artwork, produced by Do-It from the University of Washington, presents strategies for accomodating students with disabilities through a case study presentation, frequently asked quesitons and suggested resources.

Adventures in Business
Listing of individually owned small businesses, many with an emphasis in the arts.

Artists in a Year of Recession: Impact on Jobs in 2008

For artists, the economic downturn has meant correspondingly high unemployment rates and discouraging job prospects. This NEA Research Note uses unpublished data from the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics to analyze those employment conditions.

Career Resources for Artists with Disabilities
Career Resources for Artists with Disabilities The following resources are to assist the individual with a disability find resources and information in support of establishing or maintaining a career in the arts. Please note, resources are listed for informational purposes only and do not denote an endorsement by the NADC.

Effective Career Development Strategies for Young Artists with Disabilities (PDF)

This brief reports on effective strategies that 47 young artists with disabilities used to gain access to arts-related experiences in order to further their educational and career pathways.

Offering New Roles to Wounded Marines by Randal C. Archibold
Article about new career program in filmmaking for wounded service members from the NY times.

Opening Stages
The Opening Stages Newsletter is a quarterly publication written for people with disabilities, who are pursuing careers in the performing arts. Their writers examine the daily issues surrounding disabilities and the arts, and speak with those persons actively in pursuit of their dreams.

START-UP USA - Self-Employment Technical Assistance, Resources, & Training

START-UP / USA provides technical assistance and disseminates resources nationally to individuals interested in pursuing self-employment. This includes the live web cast series with successful entrepreneurs who share their secrets for success.

Where the Blind Work: Media, Marketing, and Public Relations

Within these pages, you will find written personal accounts of the various types of employment that the blind are engaged in, how they do it, how does a person enter the field, and what positive influences helped the person to achieve their goal.

Communicating With and About Individuals with Disabilities
This resource contains books, articles, and videos that provide suggestions on how to communicate respectfully and sensitively with people with disabilities.

Academic Programs in Disability Studies

This is a listing of Disability Studies programs in North American Academic Institutions.

Beyond Affliction: The Disability History Project
Beyond Affliction: The Disability History Project was a four hour documentary radio series aired in 1998 about the shared experiences of people with disabilities and their families since the beginning of the 19th century. This web site includes excerpts from the shows as well as many of the primary source documents - extended interviews, images, and texts - from which the on-air programs were developed.

Center on Disability Studies, University of Hawaii, Manoa
The Center on Disability Studies (CDS) is a University of Hawai‘i Board of Regents recognized Center focused upon development and conduct of interdisciplinary education/training, research/demonstration and evaluation, and university and community service.

Disability Rights and Independent Living Movement

UC Berkeley's website on the Disability Rights and Independent Living Movement. Discover their rich collection of primary sources exploring the social and political history of the disability movement from the 1960s to the present.

Disability Studies at UCLA

Disability Studies for Teachers

This website contains lesson plans and materials designed to help teachers integrate disability studies into social studies, history, literature, and related subjects in grades 6-12.  The plans and materials also can be adapted for use in postsecondary education.

Disability Studies Programs within AUCD Network
Links to degree and certificate programs at University Centers within the AUCD network.

History Through Deaf Eyes
History Through Deaf Eyes developed by Gallaudet University is a traveling social history exhibition aligning nearly 200 years of United States history in the experiences of deaf people. Using objects and images collected by individuals, organizations, and schools for deaf children, this exhibition illustrates the shared experiences of family life, education, and work - as well as the divergent ways deaf people see themselves, communicate, employ and adapt technology, an determine their own futures.

Museum of disABILITY History

The Museum of disABILITY History is dedicated to the collection, preservation and display of artifacts pertaining to the history of people with disabilities.

Society for Disability Studies

The Society for Disability Studies (SDS) is an international non-profit organization that promotes the study of disability in social, cultural, and political contexts. Disability Studies recognizes that disability is a key aspect of human experience, and that the study of disability has important political, social, and economic implications for society as a whole, including both disabled and nondisabled people.

The Center on Human Policy, Law, and Disability Studies
The Center is a network of academic programs, centers, student organizations, and affiliated faculty whose research, teaching, and advocacy seeks to promote the rights of people with disabilities locally, nationally, and globally, and to facilitate a critical examination of disability as an aspect of diversity in society.

The Disability Rights Movement

This online exhibit from the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History looks at the efforts of people with disabilities to secure the civil rights guaranteed to all Americans.

The Disability Social History Project
The Disability Social History Project is a community history project that includes disabled heroes, important events in disability history, and resources.

The Review of Disability Studies

The Review of Disability Studies: An International Journal (RDS) is a peer-reviewed, multidisciplinary, international journal

UIC Department of Disability and Human Development
The University of Illinois at Chicago Department of Disability and Human Development is dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of disability with the goal of removing barriers to the advancement of disabled persons.

A Long, Strange Trip by Jaehn Clare(PDF)
(Featured in ArtsACCESS, the NADC online Conference in September 1998).
Insightful and revealing, Clare's piece discusses experiences both pre and post her disability that contribute to her strong sense of SELF and journey as a performer.

Artists with Disabilities, A Cultural Explosion an Essay by Pamela Walker(PDF)
(Featured in ArtsACCESS, the NADC online Conference in September 1998).
A "movement" requires political change AND a cultural revolution-these two things need to go hand in hand in order for real change to occur. Disabled people became empowered by the Disability Rights Movement and began to refute stereotypic images of disability through their art. If disability culture exists, what are the roots of that culture and what part do artists with disabilities play in it?

How We Got To Where We Are: A Select Bibliographical Look at Disability Culture, Past, Present and Future by Steven E. Brown(PDF)
(Featured in ArtsACCESS, the NADC online Conference in September 1998).
Passionate advocate and provocative thinker, Steven Brown takes a look at the writings and work of artists with disabilities to explore disability culture.

New York Beyond Sight

Prominent New Yorkers describe their favorite works of art and culture, architecture, and city landmarks. Hear politicians, actors, artists, business and community leaders use Verbal Description to make New York's visual culture accessible to all—including people with visual impairments.

Online Magazines
The following resource directory contains a listing of online magazines that publish material on disability culture, advocacy, the arts, disability history, entertainment, and disability studies. The online magazines are aimed for the disability community, academicians, and/or the general public.

The Emergent Art/Disability Discourse(PDF)

John R. Killacky's speech on his experience with arts and access. Killacky is program officer for arts and culture for the San Francisco Foundation, and previously served as executive director of Yerba Buena Center for the Arts for six years and curator of performing arts for the Walker Art Center for eight years

Funding for Individual Artists and Arts Organizations
The following is a selective bibliography of funding related publications, information clearinghouses and funders. Many of the listings lead to additional online links or resources. The descriptions are based on information supplied by the publishers or organizations.

Funding Sources and How To Find Them. Moderated by Olivia Raynor, Ph.D., OTR. Speakers: Deborah Lewis; and Wayne Cook (PDF)
(Presented at the Association for Theatre and Accessibility Conference, May 1999).
What kinds of funding opportunities are there for Artists and organizations? How do you find them? How do you effectively get their attention (and their money?) Come listen to the straight talk about foundation, government, and corporate funding sources.

Promoting and Advertising Your Accessibility
A resource that provides information on how to promote and advertise the accessibility of your event to the disability community.

Inclusion in the Arts & Media of People with Disabilities Resources

Sightlines
Produced by Graeae, Sight lines is a 23-minute film that examines and demystifies the practice of providing access for blind and visually impaired actors.

The Employment of Persons with Disabilities in the Entertainment Industry
This 2005 Screen Actors Guild Study conducted by Olivia Raynor, Ph.D. and Katharine Hayward Ph.D. from the National Arts and Disability Center found performers with disabilities are significantly underrepresented in the entertainment industry and often reluctant to ask producers for even the most minor accommodations. See the Executive Summary and Full Report link to http://www.sag.org/files/documents/SAG%20PWD2005.pdf

Possibilities: Disabilities within Theatre
Transcript of a roundtable convened on diversity and theatre by the Non Traditional Casting Project. Led by John Belluso, playwright and Co- director of Other Voices at the Mark Taper Forum, Los Angles with Peter DuBois Artistic Director, Perseverance Theatre, Alaska; Timonthy Douglas Associate Artistic Director, Actors Theatre of Louisville, Kentucky; and Sandy Shinner, Associate Artistic Director, Victory Gardens Theater, Chicago. The focus of the discussion was about the representation of disability on stage.

Aussie Band Rocks The U.N. For The Disabled
All Things Considered, January 2, 2009 - Rudely Interrupted is an Australian indie rock band that has just embarked on its first international tour.

Disability Arts Online Library of Blogs

This section of DAO provides disabled and deaf artists with a space where they can give our readers an inside view of their art-making, opinion and day-to-day background to their working lives. These blogs provide an informative and entertaining insight into how disability and impairment are experienced from the point of view of the disabled / deaf artist.

Flora: Beyond the Seen
Once again Audio Journal teamed with the Worcester Art Museum to make their widely popular “Flora in Winter” exhibit accessible for blind and visually impaired patrons.  “Flora: Beyond the Seen” was held on Sunday, February 8 at the art museum, located at 55 Salisbury Street in Worcester. It consisted of an audio CD presentation of the exhibition program, including descriptions of the floral arrangements and the pieces of art they were located next to, and interviews with several of the arrangers.

Hearing Voices
Podcast of interviews with artists, activists, and advocates from the disabled community.

Interviews with Performers with Disabilities
Ouch! is a website from the BBC that reflects the lives and experiences of disabled people. It has articles, blogs, a very busy messageboard and an award-winning downloadable radio show - The Ouch Podcast).

Patricia E Bauer News and Commentary on Disability News
Join journalist Patricia E. Bauer as she sifts through current news and commentary, bringing you the best information about what's happening now and what it may mean for you and your loved ones

Thomas Quasthoff: A Mighty 'Voice' Soars
Talk of the Nation, August 12, 2008 - In his new memoir, The Voice, the German bass-baritone Thomas Quasthoff tackles his trials and his triumphs. He has a lot of each.

American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) Web Accessibility Guidelines
Tips, resources and guides with the goal of allowing everyone to benefit from more accessible web sites.

Designing Accessible Web Pages for the Internet
The following resources provide information on how to design accessible web pages for persons with disabilities.

WebAIM

WebAIM has provided comprehensive web accessibility solutions since 1999. These years of experience have made WebAIM one of the leading providers of web accessibility expertise internationally.