In 2003, I moved to Leeds to undertake a Master of Arts course in Disability Studies.<\/p>\n

The course was very different to any of my previous educational experiences. All of the students were Disabled, which automatically created a sense of collective identity. We felt like a family. The sense of belonging in a small community was especially important as almost all of us were international students away from our own families and familiar environments.<\/p>\n

Unlike at the Blind College, we all felt included and empowered both inside and outside of the Disability Studies group. The course was totally accessible, and to my surprise, I received the lecture handouts in advance of the lectures in accessible formats, and the transcription centre<\/a> went to great lengths to convert most of my course reading list to an electronic format.<\/p>\n

It was here in Leeds that I learned about Disabled people\u2019s rights, and through discussions with my classmates I began to realise that what we had experienced, or were experiencing, was collective oppression. I knew now that my previous personal experiences of being discriminated against were not one-off incidents.<\/p>\n

I was determined to learn more and later enrolled on the PhD programme at the University of Leeds.<\/p>\n

For my MA dissertation, I volunteered with Pyramid of Arts<\/a>, a Leeds based Disability Arts organisation for people with learning difficulties, where I facilitated the members\u2019 involvement in a range of art media. Through interviews and observations, I learned about their group identity as Disabled artists, and the empowering effects of art on their lives.<\/p>\n

Dissertation: An Investigation into the Impact of Disability Arts on the Disabled Community<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Next: University of Leeds, PhD Disability Studies<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 2003, I moved to Leeds to undertake a Master of Arts course in Disability Studies. The course was very different to any of my previous educational experiences. All of the students were Disabled, which automatically created a sense of collective identity. We felt like a family. The sense of \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":7,"menu_order":4,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/82"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/82\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":379,"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/82\/revisions\/379"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/arminehsoorenian.co.uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}