Detention and Disablement: The Politics of Indefinite Detention in Canada

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Part of the CGDS Critical Conversations series

This panel engages with disability and disablement in the context of those who lack status in Canada. We will be examining the various dynamics that put undocumented communities at a high risk of acquiring disability. Our panel brings together academic analysis, lived experience and legal expertise to discuss the history and experience of indefinite detention. We will question how disability and dynamics of disablement are human rights issues, as well as what recourses undocumented detainees can access after they become disabled at the hands of the state (either through direct violence and/or neglect). This event will be empowering and educational! 

Date and Time: -
Location: Online

Speakers

Organizer:

  • Tania Ruiz-Chapman: (she/her), PhD student in Social Justice Education, OISE

Panelists:

  • Kyon Ferril: (he/him), artist, activist, migrant and prisoner justice community organizer and educator.  Kyon is an artist, writer and organizer. He is a former immigration detainee who has faced indefinite detention and double punishment. He is one of the founding members of the Migrant Detainee Support Coalition. He is the author of '#1000336145", a collection of poems first published in 2016.  
  • Tania Ruiz-Chapman: (she/her), PhD student in Social Justice Education, OISE.  Tania’s work examines the politics of migration, citizenship and border fortification. Her work is grounded in critical disability studies, as she centers the body and makes an analysis of the socio-political and economic conditions which disable and compromise the health of many migrants - documented, precariously documented and undocumented. 
  • Julia Sande (she/her), Juris Doctor (JD), Law, human rights law and policy work for Amnesty International Canada. 

Moderator:

  • Lou Tam (they/them), PhD, MIT Postdoctoral Associate in Women and Gender studies, Disability, Migrant and Prisoner Justice Organizer. 

Host: 

  • Hilary Brown, Interim Director CGDS,  Assistant Professor, Department of Health & Society & Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto