Felicity Ford:
CEO, Producer, Director, Organiser, Publicist, Artist, Jingle-writer and Musician.
Isolde
Musician, Co-conspirator, Influence, Philosopher, Disability Rights Activist, Co-founder of WILL, (Women Independently Living in Leitrim) and fantastic force of life.
Quasi
Guide-dog, squeaky-dog-toy enthusiast, joy-embodied funster and subject of Pimp-Your-Guide harness customisation series in The Missability Radioshow.
Influences
Martin Denny, Chank Diesel's magnificent typefaces, the 1950s, accordion players everywhere, The Andrews Sisters, Christine Hill, Ellen Stohl, Isolde Carmody, Tom Lehrer, BBC Ouch!, Pain, Arthritis, The Expert Patient Programme, Electronica, The Framework Field-recording show, Domestic environments, The Oxford Bluestockings Stitch'n'bitch group, Outsider music, Lucia Pamela, Monty Python, Frida Khalo, Diane Cluck, Madonna
Sounds Like
Woman's Hour meets a bunch of field-recordists and musicians and together they create a 1950s style disability-themed radio show!
The Missability Radio Show at the UK Stitch'n'Bitch day on November 10th!
A massive thank you to I Knit London for making the Stitch'n'Bitch day so good this year. The Missability Radio Show had a stand there and lots of people got to see the fantastic Walking Stick Cosies for real!
You can see more pictures of the event on my flickr page.
The Missability Radio Show has decorated the shop window of Rachael Matthews' haberdashery, Prick your finger for the Xmas period!
If you didn't get to see the knitted walking stick cosies at the UK S'n'B day, you can see them at Rachael Matthews' shop in Bethnal Green instead! They are currently decorating the shop window and will be there until the 6th January 2008.
What is the Missability Radio Show?
The Missability Radio Show is a production I made for my final project at Oxford Brookes University, on the MA in Interdisciplinary Arts Programme. The Missability Radio Show consists at the moment of 3 podcasts each of around 40 minutes in length, that can be downloaded from the official Missability website. The Missability Radio Show takes a fresh look at the design of assistive technology and investigates how we feel about our equipment, what, if anything, we'd change about it, and how we might go about customising it in ways that don't compromise on functionality. The Missability Radio Show also explores the soundscape experienced by people with hearing impairments in the Deaf Silence and Sound feature of the show. At it's heart, The Missability Radio Show is about changing perceptions about disability. Equipment is the starting point for this mission because it is one of the ways in which disability is made visible in the world.
Created out of everyday conversations, casio-keyboard beats and simple songs, The Missability Radio Show presents us with an informative, fun, ever-practical and empowering series of ideas about impairment, living-aids and above all, dignity.
The Missability Radio Show Knitted Walking Stick Cosy Competition! notably organised and hosted a knitted walking stick cosy competition as part of its ongoing investigation into thrifty, fun and practical ways to customise living aids. You can read about the outcome of The Knitted Walking Stick Cosy Competition on the official Missability website. A second round of this competition is now open also; details will be on the website soon!
Here's a Video Feature, made as part of The Missability Radio Show!
The Missability Radio Show has been programmed with guest interviews, conversation pieces, fiction works and music. Anticipated features for the show include:
News relating to The Knitted Walking Stick Cosy Competition
a series of episodes covering equipment customisation;
a collaboration called Deaf Silence and Sound, about what hearing-aid users hear when they take out their hearing aids; and
interviews with staff and patients at Shopmobility Oxford about living-aids;
a discussion on the ins and outs of creating a walking-stick cosy;
a feature entitled 'does black really go with everything?'
Other, hard-to-define audio joy; [insert your ideas here]
It is hoped that the Missability Radio Show will stimulate many debates over a nice cup of tea and inspire novel construction projects and that people will enjoy listening to it.
Want to join in?
The Missability Radio Show may yet grow beyond the three episodes already created! Do you have a piece of equipment you love or hate, would like to see redesigned or consider to be perfect, have customised yourself or simply enjoy as-is? If so, please get in touch, I'd love to talk to you and hear your views!
Are you are a hearing-aid user and interested in the Deaf Silence and Sound project? Please contact me and I can give you more information about the project.
I am interested in developing stories, songs, interviews, competitions and so on. Please take a look around this myspace and if you have something which you feel 'fits' the idea for the show, get in touch!
Why am I doing this?
I've been obsessed with the design of disability equipment for several years now. When I realised early on in my twenties that it was time to buy a walking-stick I was dismayed by the lack of choice available. I really wanted a red and white polka dot walking stick that would reflect my clothes and sense of style and I wanted to be able to buy such an item without a sales clerk tutting and saying 'it's such a shame... at such a young age...'
Similarly, a friend of mine recently felt embarrassed by the muddy, grey and tattered appearance of her Guide Dog harness; she felt it spoiled the look she was trying to put together for the opening night of her exhibition. She couldn't find anything other than the standard issue yellow and white harness for her guide-dog so she asked me if I could do something with my sewing machine.
Another friend wanted some solution for covering her crutches so that they wouldn't stand out so much against the bridesmaid dress she was going to wear at her brother's wedding and so I suggested we could maybe do something with felt.
What are your stories?
Can you help me find this person?
I am still also desperately keen to meet the woman who wrote this brilliant article in Ouch! magazine, against the customisation of disability equipment. If you know how I might reach her, get in touch!
Download all three episodes of The Missability Radio Show here.
****HEY U! I LOVED ALL YOUR STUFF LAST YEAR, YOU MADE IT A GREAT ONE!!**** HAPPY NEW YEAR, HAVE A GREAT '08
Jake Zee and Ferdinand the Sax are compiling a new set of system-bustin, ground-breakin' material to spearhead the long awaited revolution! The first recorded song is up online at
www.myspace.com/jakezee
Its called TRIBUTE TO 'SEIZE THE DAY' (COOL R 'n' B) Also check out 'BASTARD MASTERCARD', 'SLEEPWALKIN' (9/11 EXPOSED!), and the lush 'ROLLING THROUGH' and see if the others grab you!
