Kristin Booth Glen
University Professor and Dean Emerita
CUNY School of Law
glen@law.cuny.edu

Writes and speaks about human rights and intellectual disability, especially Article 12 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities.

Mariette J. Bates
Academic Director of Disability Studies
School of Professional Studies

Mariette began her career as the program director of One to One, a foundation created by Geraldo Rivera after his exposé of Willowbrook State School. She went on to be vice president of the Maidstone Foundation, specializing in systems change advocacy for underserved populations. She is a graduate of Empire State College, the Columbia University Institute for Not-for-Profit Management, and the Union Institute, where she was awarded her doctorate in philanthropy and developmental disabilities.

Lorraine Byrnes
Associate Professor, Nursing
Hunter College and CUNY Graduate Center

Lorraine Byrnes PhD, FNP-BC, PMHNP-BC directs the RN to BS program at Hunter and teaches at both Hunter and The CUNY Graduate Center. Her research explores the perinatal period for women made vulnerable by disabilities, mental illness, HIV or incarceration.

Vandana Chaudhry
Assistant Professor, Social Work
College of Staten Island
Vandana.Chaudhry@csi.cuny.edu

Dr. Chaudhry earned her Ph.D. in Social Work and Disability Studies from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her research explores disability at the intersection of development, globalization, neoliberalism, and the politics of subject-formation in rural South India. She has worked on disability rights initiatives in developing countries, and served as a consultant for international institutions including the World Bank.

Sarah Chinn
Associate Professor, English
Hunter College
sarah.chinn@hunter.cuny.edu

Sarah E. Chinn teaches in and is chair of the English Department at Hunter College. She is the author of Technology and the Logic of American Racism and Inventing Modern Adolescence: Children of Immigrants in Turn-of-the-Century America, as well as articles in Disability Studies, Childhood Studies, and 19th Century US literatures and cultures.

David J. Connor
Professor/Chairperson of Special Education
Hunter College
dconnor@hunter.cuny.edu

David J. Connor, Ed.D, is a professor and chairperson of the Special Education Department at Hunter College. In addition to publishing journal articles and chapters, David is the author/editor of six disability-themed books. His research interests include learning disabilities, inclusive education, and intersectional understandings of disability.

Scott Dexter
Professor, Computer and Information Science
Brooklyn College
sdexter@brooklyn.cuny.edu

As a scholar who is sometimes a technologist, sometimes a humanist, I have a few interests related to disability scholarship (though have yet to publish anything on them): (1) software and accessibility, (2) artificial intelligence and cognitive difference, (3) artificial bodies (androids, cyborgs, etc) and their dis/abilities.

Ryan Donovan
Ph.D. Candidate, Theater
The Graduate Center
rdonovan@gradcenter.cuny.edu

Ryan is writing a dissertation on the inclusion of stigmatized and non-normative bodies in Broadway musicals from 1975-2015. He is a writing fellow at School of Professional Studies and has also taught at Baruch and Hunter.

Brenda Foley
Carol L. Zicklin Endowed Chair and Visiting Professor of Theater
Brooklyn College
Brenda.Foley@brooklyn.cuny.edu

Brenda teaches and conducts research on disability and cultural representation. Her current book project is Bind Up the Broken Hearted: Women and Narratives of Disability in Nineteenth-Century Asylums and her recent play, Forever Unknown, employs archival research from those asylums to excavate stories of institutionalized women.

Jonathan Gray
Associate Professor of English
John Jay College
jgray@jjay.cuny.edu

Jonathan Gray is the editor of the Journal of Comics and Culture, co-editor of Disability in Comic Books and Graphic Novels, and the author of Civil Rights in the White Literary Imagination (University Press of Mississippi, 2013). He’s published academic articles on Modernism and the Harlem Renaissance, Kyle Baker’s graphic novel Nat Turner, Jay Z’s relationship to Black masculinity, and Trayvon Martin in popular culture. His journalism on comics and popular culture has appeared at EW.com, Salon.com, and The New Inquiry.

Kristen Gillespie-Lynch
Assistant Professor, Psychology
College of Staten Island; Graduate Center
kgillyn@gmail.com

I investigate strengths and weaknesses associated with ASD across the lifespan. With my collaborators, I examine, and develop trainings to improve, conceptions of autism among people with and without ASD internationally.  I direct and evaluate a mentorship program for college students with ASD and other disabilities.

Beth Haller
Professor, Mass Media
Towson University, Maryland
bah621@gmail.com

Beth Haller, Ph.D., is the author of Representing Disability in an Ableist World: Essays on Mass Media (Advocado Press, 2010) and Byline of Hope: Collected Newspaper and Magazine Writings of Helen Keller (Advocado Press, 2015), as well as many academic articles and book chapters. She currently maintains a blog at http://media-dis-n-dat.blogspot.com/

Amy E. Hughes
Associate Professor, Theater History & Criticism
Brooklyn College
hughes@brooklyn.cuny.edu

Amy E. Hughes investigates the relationship between theater and visual, print, and material culture in the US during the 1800s, including spectacular presentations of disability. Her first book, Spectacles of Reform: Theater and Activism in Nineteenth-Century America (2012), won the Barnard Hewitt Award for Outstanding Research in Theatre History.

Stephanie Jensen-Moulton
Director of the Conservatory
Associate Professor, Musicology
Brooklyn College
SJensenMoulton@brooklyn.cuny.edu

Stephanie Jensen-Moulton is Director of the Conservatory and Associate Professor of musicology at Brooklyn College, City University of New York. Her publications include articles and chapters on American music and disability, including styles as diverse as hip-hop and opera. She is also a co-editor of The Oxford Handbook of Disability Studies (2015).

Barbara Katz Rothman
Professor, Sociology
The Graduate Center
BKatzRothman@gc.cuny.edu

Barbara’s work on disability issues grew out of her research on issues related to motherhood, and in particular a study of prenatal testing, The Tentative Pregnancy.  That brought her to more work on genetics, and a later book The Book of Life: A Personal and Ethical Guide to Race, Normality, and the Implications of the Human Genome Project.  She occasionally teaches a doctoral seminar on The Sociology of Disability.

Deborah (Devva) Kasnitz
Adjunct Professor, Anthropology
School of Professional Studies
devva@earthlink.net

Directed research at World Institute on Disability & AHEAD.On founding boards: Society for Disability Studies, Disability Research in Anthro, & APRIL, current work on speech impairment & disability services in higher education. I was a 2000 Switzer Fellow & received the 2014 SDS Senior Scholar Award.

Joseph A. LoGiudice
Director, AccessAbility Center/Student Disability Services
City College
jlogiudice@ccny.cuny.edu

Joseph A. LoGiudice is a social worker, writer, and an educator. His professional work is in the field of disability policy and services. Joseph is pursing a Ph.D. in History from St. John’s University that will focus on an analysis of activism from the Disability and LGBTQ Rights Movements.

Susan E. Longtin
Associate Professor, Speech-Language Pathology
Brooklyn College
slongtin@brooklyn.cuny.edu

Susan Longtin is Associate Professor of Speech Communication Arts and Sciences at Brooklyn College where she co-directs the interprofessional Advanced Certificate Program in Autism Spectrum Disorders. She leads parent-based communication interventions for children with disabilities. Her current research focuses on autobiographies by adults with ASD.

Amber J Martin
Lecturer, Psychology
Hunter College
am2631@hunter.cuny.edu

Dr. Martin is a developmental psychologist who studies language acquisition and cognitive development in deaf children in the US and Nicaragua. Her research focuses on mechanisms underlying early language access and developmental outcomes.

Jorge Matos Valldejuli
Asst Professor & Reference Librarian
Hostos Community College
jmatos@hostos.cuny.edu

Jorge Matos Valldejuli is an Assistant Professor & Reference Librarian at Hostos Community College since 2014. Although new to the field of Disability Studies, he is interested in the intersections between race, gender, and class in disability history.

Julie E. Maybee
Professor, Philosophy, Disability Studies
Lehman College; School of Professional Studies
julie.maybee@lehman.cuny.edu

Julie Maybee is an Associate Professor of Philosophy, the director of the interdisciplinary Disability Studies Minor at Lehman College, and a Consortial Associate Professor in the Disability Studies Masters Program at the School of Professional Studies. She writes about the intersections between race, culture and understandings of—as well as the experience of—disability.

Olivia Loksing Moy
Assistant Professor
Lehman College
olivia.moy@lehman.cuny.edu

Olivia Loksing Moy is Assistant Professor of English at Lehman College and faculty on the Disability Studies Minor committee. She specializes in in Romantic and Victorian literature with a special interest in poetics and theories of disability, as well as the intersections between academia, activism, and social justice. Professor Moy also serves as faculty advisor for the student LGBTQ+ Alliance and director of the English Honors Program.

Adina Mulliken
Assistant Professor and Social Work Librarian
Hunter College
am2621@hunter.cuny.edu

I am interested in digital accessibility policy, practice and user experiences in libraries and higher education. I am a reference librarian and I have a CAS in Disability Studies from Syracuse University.

Jessica Murray
Doctoral Student, Human Development
The Graduate Center
jmurray@gradcenter.cuny.edu

Jessica Murray is a doctoral student in Human Development at The Graduate Center, CUNY and a Futures Initiative Fellow. She is interested in how transportation disadvantage for people with mobility disabilities impacts social integration and psychological well being of individuals throughout their life course.

Ruth O’Brien
Professor, Political Science
Graduate Center
robrien@gc.cuny.edu

Bodies in Revolt: Gender, Disability, & A Workplace Ethic of Care; Crippled Justice: The History of Modern Disability Policy in the Workplace, Gustavus Meyers Center honorable mention; Voices from the Edge: Narratives about the ADA, Gustavus Meyers honorable mention; & received CUNY Chancellor’s Disability Awareness Award.

Louis Olander
Doctoral Student, Urban Education
The Graduate Center
louis.olander@gmail.com

Louis Olander is a doctoral student in the Urban Education program at the City University of New York (CUNY) Graduate Center and teaches graduate and undergraduate students about inclusive education in the Special Education department at Hunter College.

Vaclav Paris
Assistant Professor
City College
vaclavparis@gmail.com

I’m currently working on a book about the relations between evolutionary thought, including eugenics, and modernist literature. I have published an article on Ezra Pound and Disability (Paideuma, 2015). I was also co-organizer of the Disability and Modernism conference at the University of Pennsylvania (2013).

Lisa Pollich
Assistant Director
School of Professional Studies
lisa.pollich@cuny.edu

Lisa Pollich is Assistant Director of Disability Studies at CUNY School of Professional Studies and Adjunct Assistant Professor.  Lisa holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from CUNY Graduate School and MS in Publishing.  Lisa most recently directed Project REACH, CUNY-wide initiative to improve services to CUNY’s students on the autism spectrum.

Kristina Richardson
Associate Professor, Islamic History, Queens College
Associate Professor, Middle Eastern Studies, The Graduate Center
Deputy Director, Middle East & Middle Eastern American Center
kristina.richardson@qc.cuny.edu

Professor Richardson is the author of *Difference and Disability in the Medieval Islamic World: Blighted Bodies* (Edinburgh, 2012), and the author of several articles on Islam and disabilities, an early modern Syrian finger alphabet, and the disabling effects of a 15th-century Cairene’s drug overdose.

Julia Miele Rodas
Associate Professor, English
Bronx Community College
julia.rodas@bcc.cuny.edu

Julia Miele Rodas teaches and writes about disability, rhetoric, and identity. She is co-editor of The Madwoman and the Blindman: Jane Eyre, Discourse, Disability (Ohio State UP, 2012) and of the Literary Disability Studies book series (Palgrave Macmillan). She is currently working on a monograph—Autistic Disturbances—theorizing autism poetics.

Chris Rosa
Interim Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs
City University of New York

Chris Rosa is Interim Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs for Student Affairs at the City University of New York. He holds a doctorate in sociology and his dissertation is entitled “Disability Rites: The Construction of Disability Culture.” Rosa regularly authors chapters for the Kaplan Interactive Division of Simon & Schuster advising students with disabilities on how to choose colleges, graduate, and professional schools.

Irina Carlota (Lotti) Silber
Associate Professor & Chair of Department of Anthropology, Gender Studies, and International Studies
City College of New York
isilber@ccny.cuny.edu

Lotti is Associate Professor of Anthropology at City College of New York. She enjoys teaching courses in medical anthropology, on war & trauma, childhood studies, and disability studies. Her book, Everyday Revolutionaries, documents the aftermaths of war in El Salvador. A new project, Luminous, is an ethnography of childhood genetic difference.

Jitka Nelb Sinecka, Ph.D.
Disability Studies
CUNY, Syracuse University
sineckaj@gmail.com

Jitka Nelb Sinecka received her Ph.D. in Disability Studies in 2009. Since then she has been teaching online courses in d/Deafness and disability, Autism, or Disability and embodiment.

Talia Schaffer
Professor, English
Queens College and Graduate Center
talia.schaffer@qc.cuny.edu

I’ve written about how Victorian disabled characters achieve social success through their very disability (in Romance’s Rivals, forthcoming Jan 2016). My current book project is on ethics of care – I look at care relations as modeled (and critiqued) in the Victorian novel.

Esther Son
Assistant Professor, Social Work
College of Staten Island
esther.son@csi.cuny.edu

Dr. Son’s primary research interest is the enhancement of the health and well-being of children and adults with disabilities and their families. In particular, she is interested in the school adjustment and social inclusion of children with developmental disabilities, and their health status and health disparities.

Joseph Straus
Distinguished Professor, Music
Graduate Center
jstraus@gc.cuny.edu

Professor Straus has published widely on topics in modernist music.  His most recent publications are among the first to bring the insights of Disability Studies to Musicology.

Ekaterina Sukhanova
University Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, CUNY Central Office
Ph.D. Comparative Literature

Ekaterina Sukhanova serves as an elected officer of the section on Art& Psychiatry and Literature & Psychiatry of the World Psychiatric Association. She has a number of publications on cultural constructs of mental health and continues to curate exhibits of art brut as a vehicle for fighting stigma.

Pat Sutherland-Cohen
Adjunct Professor, Interdisciplinary Studies
Center for Worker Education (City College);
School of Professional Studies
psutherland-cohen@ccny.cuny.edu

As an award-winning “TEACHER OF THE YEAR” Pat focuses on the needs of all learners and the higher education goals of justice activism, including publishing techniques for HIV/AIDS instruction for people with intellectual disabilities. Her creative materials are part of the permanent collection of The Museum of the City of New York.

Barbra Teater
Associate Professor, Social Work
College of Staten Island
barbra.teater@csi.cuny.edu

Dr. Teater conducts research on social work education and the health & wellbeing of older adults. She is interested in community-based programs and preventative programs that will enhance the mental and physical health of older adults as well as reduce the impact of functional limitations or age-related disabilities.

Kylah Torre
Doctoral Candidate, Disabilities Studies in Education
CUNY Graduate Center
torre.kylah@gmail.com

Kylah Torre is a doctoral student in Urban Education at CUNY Graduate Center with a focus on the education of students with mental disabilities. She is a former special educator.

Esther Isabelle Wilder
Professor, Sociology
Lehman College
Esther.Wilder@lehman.cuny.edu

Esther Isabelle Wilder’s work focuses on the healthcare needs of individuals with disabilities & the social construction of disability. She is the author of Voices from the Heartland: The Needs and Rights of Individuals with Disabilities (with W.H. Walters, Brookline Books) & Wheeling and Dealing: Living with Spinal Cord Injury (Vanderbilt UP).

Linda Yau
Graduate Student
CUNY SPS
linda.yau@spsmail.cuny.edu

Linda works as an adjunct librarian in various libraries and has a scholarly interest in issues of disability services, disability studies, and universal design.

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