Being Heumann with Judy Heumann
Judy Heumann is an internationally recognized leader in the disability community and a lifelong civil rights advocate. From fighting to attend grade school to winning a lawsuit against the New York City school system for denying her a teacher’s license, her actions throughout her life set a precedent that have fundamentally improved rights for people with disabilities, sparking a national movement that led to the creation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. She has worked with a wide range of activist organizations, NGOs, and governments since the 1970s, serving in the Clinton and Obama administrations and as the World Bank’s first adviser on disability and development. In Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist, she recounts her lifelong battle to achieve respect, acceptance, and inclusion in society.
The author was in conversation with Lauren Gilbert, Senior Manager for Public Services at the Center for Jewish History.
This program was supported by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the human endeavor, and public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
This program was presented on July 15, 2020.
At Lunch with Judy Heumann
Julie Salamon sits down with disability rights activist and author, Judith Heumann. Since the 1970's, Judy has worked with a wide range of activist organizations, NGOs, and government agencies directly contributing to the development of human rights legislation and policy benefiting disabled people.
At Lunch with Anita Hollander
Julie Salamon sits down with singer, actress, and advocate, Anita Hollander. Anita has performed throughout Europe, Asia, Russia and America, in film, TV, and live theatre. Her award-winning original solo musicals Still Standing & Spectacular Falls have played Off-Broadway, at the Kennedy Center, The White House, nationally & internationally. She serves as SAG-AFTRA National Chair of Performers with Disabilities, and also directs the Village Temple Children’s Choir.
Embodying Liberty: American Jewish Attorneys and the Case for Humanizing Public Charge
In 1891, the United States Congress codified a host of physical and mental conditions that would close America’s gates to hopeful immigrants. Since 1882, this policy—the public charge provision—had functioned as a primary means of restricting immigration. While its commodification of health and pathologization of poverty affected all immigrants, eastern European Jews particularly felt its impact, capturing the attention of American Jewish lawyers. Hannah Zaves-Greene examines the legal advocacy of Max Kohler, Abram Elkus, Simon Wolf, and Louis Marshall, American Jewish attorneys who marshalled their deep knowledge of American jurisprudence to defang the law. Focusing on Kohler’s work, we will examine his pro bono defenses of two young Jewish women, who each—about a decade apart—faced the state’s allegation that they had become medical public charges. As he dealt with local officials and argued before the courts, Kohler meticulously framed his opposition to public charge, articulating his philosophy of American citizenship at the nexus of disability and national belonging.
Hannah Zaves-Greene is a doctoral candidate in American Jewish history at New York University’s Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies. She is currently the Fellow in American Jewish Studies at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, and a recipient of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute Research Award. Her dissertation, Able to Be American: American Jews and the Public Charge Provision in United States Immigration Policy, 1891-1934, explores how American Jewish women and men engaged with discrimination on the basis of health, disability, and gender in federal immigration law and its administration. She has taught at both the New School for Social Research and Cooper Union, and has published articles in both AJS Review and American Jewish History.
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum Web Resources
Holocaust Encyclopedia: Euthanasia Program
Summarizes the Nazi efforts to systematically kill the institutionalized mentally and physically handicapped. Describes the program’s history, the selection process, and the collaboration of medical personnel. Includes victim statistics, photographs, personal stories, a map, historical film footage, and a list of related links.
Holocaust Encyclopedia: Hadamar
Discusses the euthanasia activities carried out at the health facilities in the German town of Hadamar. Includes photographs, maps and film footage.
Holocaust Encyclopedia: The Hadamar Trial
Presents information related to the war crimes trials held for the staff of the Hadamar facility in the fall of 1945. Includes archival footage.
The Murder of People with Disabilities
Briefly summarizes the Nazis’ treatment of the disabled during the 1930s and 1940s. Also provides related photographs and links to additional sources of information on the disabled during the Holocaust.
Disability Social History Project
Includes a bibliography of resources on Judaism and Disability.