Seminar 2008

Spending time in institutions

This international seminar was held on 4th July 2008 at The Open University, Milton Keynes and was preceded by the 2008 Conference Spending Time on the 3rd July 2008

Morning session

Introduction
Jan Walmsley and Mabel Cooper (co-chairs)

'Little better than chattel slaves' - Inmate Labour in an Australian Institution for Learning Disability
Lee-Ann Monk

In February 1937 the Australian tabloid newspaper Truth reported that a resident of Victoria 's Kew Cottages was severely injured when she caught her hand in a mincing machine while employed in the institution's kitchen.
Read the full abstract

Leisure time in learning disability institutions: summer camps and scouting
Nigel Ingham and David O'Driscoll

Drawing upon a range of archive material, including oral history recordings, we take a glance at scouting (with some passing reference to guiding) and its off shoots in learning disability institutions during the twentieth century.
Read the full abstract

The dimension of time in civilian and institutional order
Frank Bylov

I work as a Senior Lecturer/Researcher at the Department of Social Work at University College West in Esbjerg, Denmark. My main interests are: patterns of marginalisation and subculture, identity-politics, and self-organisation of people with (learning) disabilities - and its potential feedback to services and professionals in the welfare (market) praxis.
Read the full abstract

Spending time in an institution in Iceland in the 1970s
Eygló Ebba Hreinsdóttir and Gudrun Stefansdottir

Ebba moved to an institution in the late 70s when she was 19 years old. Gudrun started to work at the same institution a few years later. After Ebba moved from the institution they didn't have contact for many years but since 2003 they have worked closely together on a life-history research project.
Read the full abstract

Afternoon session

Introduction
Daniel Doherty and Rohhss Chapman (co-chairs)

Spending time in Normansfield
Heather Cadbury, Patricia Collen and Michelle Whitmore

Goffman's covert study of closed institutions (1991) revealed an existence for the inmates which shocked the western world, particularly the privileged and liberal members of society. He observed that many were often 'herded into a day room to be observed by one pair of eyes', and this was how they spent most of their time.
Read the full abstract

Living in an institution in Ireland - in my own words
Jean Wright, Bill Roberts and Carol Hamilton

Bill Roberts talks about his life in Ireland, and Carol Hamilton talks about working with Bill to tell his life story, and getting his story put onto a website.
Read the full abstract