Title search results
Showing 1 - 20 of 2706 items
Falling for myself: a memoir /
By Dorothy Ellen Palmer. 2019
Born with congenital anomalies in both feet, then called birth defects, Dorothy Ellen Palmer was adopted as a toddler by…
a wounded 1950s family who had no idea how to handle the tangled complexities of adoption and disability. From repeated childhood surgeries to an activist awakening at university to decades as a feminist teacher, mom, improv coach and unionist, she tried to hide being different. But now, standing proud with her walker, she's sharing her journey. Navigating abandonment, abuse and ableism, she finds her birth parents and a new chosen family in the disability community. 2019.Disfigured: On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space
By Amanda Leduc. 2020
Fairy tales shape how we see the world, so what happens when you identify more with the Beast than Beauty?…
If every disabled character is mocked and mistreated, how does the Beast ever imagine a happily-ever-after? Amanda Leduc looks at fairy tales from the Brothers Grimm to Disney, showing us how they influence our expectations and behaviour and linking the quest for disability rights to new kinds of stories that celebrate difference. ‘Leduc peels the flesh from the fairy tales we grew up loving and strips them down to their skeletons to skilfully reveal how they influence the way we think about disability. She contrasts the stories we have with the ones we wish we had, incorporating her own life. Her wisdom lands like a punch in the heart, leaving a sizable dent that reshapes how we see tales we’ve been telling for centuries. She also – and this is the best part – suggests how we might tell new fairy tales, how we can forge new stories.’ – Adam Pottle, author of Voice ‘A unique and dazzling study … a revolutionary approach to understanding why we are drawn to fairy tales and how they shape our lives.’ – Jack Zipes, author of Grimm Legacies ‘Each chapter is a gem, but the kind of gem that turns into a knife, into a mirror, into a portal. Leduc’s real magic? That she transforms her readers as surely as any world.’ – Mira Jacob, author of Good TalkSitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body
By Rebekah Taussig. 2020
A memoir-in-essays from disability advocate and creator of the Instagram account @sitting_pretty Rebekah Taussig, processing a lifetime of memories to…
paint a beautiful, nuanced portrait of a body that looks and moves differently than most.Growing up as a paralyzed girl during the 90s and early 2000s, Rebekah Taussig only saw disability depicted as something monstrous (The Hunchback of Notre Dame), inspirational (Helen Keller), or angelic (Forrest Gump). None of this felt right; and as she got older, she longed for more stories that allowed disability to be complex and ordinary, uncomfortable and fine, painful and fulfilling.Writing about the rhythms and textures of what it means to live in a body that doesn’t fit, Rebekah reflects on everything from the complications of kindness and charity, living both independently and dependently, experiencing intimacy, and how the pervasiveness of ableism in our everyday media directly translates to everyday life. Disability affects all of us, directly or indirectly, at one point or another. By exploring this truth in poignant and lyrical essays, Taussig illustrates the need for more stories and more voices to understand the diversity of humanity. Sitting Pretty challenges us as a society to be patient and vigilant, practical and imaginative, kind and relentless, as we set to work to write an entirely different story.Victory at Vimy: Canada Comes of Age, April 9-12, 1917
By Ted Barris. 2007
National BestsellerAt the height of the First World War, on Easter Monday April 9, 1917, in early morning sleet, sixteen…
battalions of the Canadian Corps rose along a six-kilometre line of trenches in northern France against the occupying Germans. All four Canadian divisions advanced in a line behind a well-rehearsed creeping barrage of artillery fire. By nightfall, the Germans had suffered a major setback. The Ridge, which other Allied troops had assaulted previously and failed to take, was firmly in Canadian hands. The Canadian Corps had achieved perhaps the greatest lightning strike in Canadian military history. One Paris newspaper called it "Canada’s Easter gift to France." Of the 40,000 Canadians who fought at Vimy, nearly 10,000 became casualties. Many of their names are engraved on the famous monument that now stands on the ridge to commemorate the battle. It was the first time Canadians had fought as a distinct national army, and in many ways, it was a coming of age for the nation. The achievement of the Canadians on those April days in 1917 has become one of our lasting myths. Based on first-hand accounts, including archival photographs and maps, it is the voices of the soldiers who experienced the battle that comprise the thrust of the book. Like JUNO: Canadians at D-Day, Ted Barris paints a compelling and surprising human picture of what it was like to have stormed and taken Vimy Ridge.Westray: Mon passage des ténèbres à la lumière
By Vernon Theriault. 2019
Dans ce livre, Theriault décrit son expérience dans la mine du comté de Pictou, ses combats personnels à la suite…
du désastre et la façon dont il a donné un sens nouveau à sa vie en participant à la campagne de lobbying de longue haleine du Syndicat des Métallos, qui a mené à l’adoption de la Loi Westray en 2004.Mrs. Beaton's Question: My Nine Years at the Halifax School for the Blind
By Robert Mercer. 2020
?Robert Mercer's life could have been very different. He was born with very low vision and, as a youngster, struggled…
in school. But through the intervention of a caring teacher and the support of his family, he found his way to the Halifax School for the Blind and into the classroom of Mrs. Beaton. It was there that he discovered his voice, a voice he uses to recount his remarkable journey from a shy little boy to a community leader.Life's Not over, It Just Looks Different
By Christopher Warner. 2016
Life happens, and sometimes it changes in ways that we never expected.After experiencing a surgical complication that rendered me legally…
blind, I decided there were two choices ahead of me: roll over and die, essentially giving in to the fact that life wasn't going to be the same as before, or get on with life and figure out how to move forward with reduced eyesight.This book shares a personal story of trying to bounce back from a life changing event. There were lots of good days and even some funny moments along the way. But no recovery is ever all smooth sailing. There were also bad days, and times when self-doubt and despair took over.Beryl: The Making of a Disability Activist
By Dustin Galer. 2023
The story of a mid-century working-class housewife whose extraordinary physical transformation empowered her to become a dynamic social activist who…
fueled a movement to create a more inclusive future for people with disabilities."I lost everything that mattered in my life because I went Deaf and Blind. It was then, in the depths…
of challenges, that I found salvations. It took my disabilities to help me realize what an incredible life I could lead. Sport. Philanthropy. Storytelling. This book is about reaffirming that anyone and everyone needs to know anything is possible and no matter how tough things get, there is always going to be another tomorrow." -- cover.Beryl: The Making of a Disability Activist
By Dustin Galer. 2023
The story of a mid-century working-class housewife whose extraordinary physical transformation empowered her to become a dynamic social activist who…
fueled a movement to create a more inclusive future for people with disabilities.Trench Art: the stories behind the talismans
By Judy Waugh. 2015
This unique collection of trench art evokes emotion. Each piece was created in turmoil but all are beautiful - intuitive…
works of art about music, faith, love and honour. 56 pieces are from WWI. All are signed with name and service number. Most are small and tactile, often worn as a fob. Many are made from coins and brass from the battlefield; some are carved in bone and wood. Most belonged to young soldiers who were killed in action or died of their wounds - at Gallipoli, France and Flanders, Palestine and Mesopotamia. Twelve belonged to Anzacs. This book tells their stories - of men from England, Scotland, Wales, Australia and New Zealand, bound by adventure and loyalty to their common ancestry. . . . . . The engraved ID holds the key to the story. The heart of each story is different. There are stories of courage under fire and desertions at Colombo; of death from sunstroke and survival through three theatres of war; of medals awarded and fines for misadventures; of men from the Outback in Queensland and young lads from Boys Homes in Kent. There are insights into social history - the ostracism and disgrace of venereal disease, the generational poverty in industrial cities, the imperative to secure oil lines in Iraq. And there are heartbroken letters from those left behind. . . . . . This book will appeal to collectors of artefacts, coins and militaria. It will also appeal to those interested in family history, social history, military history and art therapy in trauma. So much can be found from so little. The range of artefacts may also interest researchers. There are over 64 artefacts in all, including two from the Boer War, one from Crimea, and seven from the convict era - all bearing testament to the primal need to carve a name.Wheelchair Warrior: Gangs, Disability, and Basketball
By Melvin Juette, Ronald Berger. 2008
What's that pig outdoors?
By Henry Kisor. 2010
Henry Kisor lost his hearing at age three to meningitis and encephalitis but went on to excel in the most…
verbal of professions as a literary journalist. This new and expanded edition of Kisor's engrossing memoir recounts his life as a deaf person in a hearing world and addresses heartening changes over the last two decades due to the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and advancements in cochlear implants and modes of communication. _x000B_Kisor tells of his parents' drive to raise him as a member of the hearing and speaking world by teaching him effective lip-reading skills at a young age and encouraging him to communicate with his hearing peers. _x000B_Kisor updates the continuing disagreements between those who advocate sign language and those who practice speech and lip-reading, discusses the increased acceptance of deaf people's abilities and idiosyncrasies, and considers technological advancements that have enabled deaf people to communicate with the hearing world on its own terms.The Illusion of Victory: America in World War I
By Thomas Fleming. 2003
In this sweeping historical canvas, Thomas Fleming undertakes nothing less than a drastic revision of our experience in World War…
I. He reveals how the British and French duped Wilson into thinking the war was as good as won, and there would be no need to send an army overseas. He describes a harried president making speech after speech proclaiming America's ideals while supporting espionage and sedition acts that sent critics to federal prisons. And he gives a harrowing account of how the Allies did their utmost to turn the American Expeditionary Force into cannon fodder on the Western Front. Thoroughly researched and dramatically told, The Illusion of Victory offers compelling testimony to the power of a president's visionary ideals-as well as a starkly cautionary tale about the dangers of applying them in a war-maddened world.No Ordinary Determination: Percy Black and Harry Murray of the First AIF
By Jeff Hatwell. 2005
An epic tale of two ordinary individuals thrown into theextraordinary and surreal world of the Gallipoli campaignas soldiers of the…
First AIF in WWI.Percy Black and Harry Murray were plain hard-workingAustralians whose paths crossed in Western Australiawhen they enlisted in support of country and empire. Thepowerful narrative paints a complex and thorough pictureof the heroism, loyalty, inventiveness, mateship, stoicismand strength of the many individuals, on all sides, caughtup in the horror of the ‘war to end all wars’.The War Story Of Dillwyn Parrish Starr
By Louis Starr, Dillwyn Parrish Starr. 2013
Dillwyn Parrish Starr led a short life but he lived it at a tremendous speed when the First World…
War broke out he was a star American Football Player and scholar at Harvard However spurred on by his convictions he sailed to the U K in a rush and signed up for service as soon as possible thereafter he saw a great deal of fighting with the Royal Navy Armored car detachment However as the war stagnated to the static bloody fighting in the trenches he felt compelled to transfer to the prestigious Grenadier Guards in the British Army Always heavily engaged Dillwyn fought with great courage in both Flanders and on the Gallipoli campaign before falling to the overwhelming fire of the Germans at Ginchy during the infernal Somme battle in 1916 His letters are a vivid memento to a man who was universally respected even in a regiment with such high standards as the Grenadiers Guards cheerful and upbeat snuffed out too soon in the hell of World War OneThe Sunken Gold: A Story of World War I Espionage and the Greatest Treasure Salvage in History
By Joseph A. Williams. 2017
On January 25, 1917, HMS Laurentic struck two German mines off the coast of Ireland and sank. The ship was…
carrying 44 tons of gold bullion to the still-neutral United States via Canada in order to finance the war effort for Britain and its allies. Britain desperately needed that sunken treasure, but any salvage had to be secret since the British government dared not alert the Germans to the presence of the gold. Lieutenant Commander Guybon Damant was the most qualified officer to head the risky mission. Wild gales battered the wreck into the shape of an accordion, turning the operation into a multiyear struggle of man versus nature. As the war raged on, Damant was called off the salvage to lead a team of covert divers to investigate and search through the contents of recently sunk U-boats for ciphers, minefield schematics, and other secrets. The information they obtained, once in the hands of British intelligence, proved critical toward Allied efforts to defeat the U-boats and win the war.But Damant had become obsessed with completing his long-deferred mission. His team struggled for five more years as it became apparent that the work could only be accomplished by muscle, grit, and persistence. Using newly discovered sources, author Joseph A. Williams provides the first full-length account of the quest for the Laurentic's gold. More than an incredible story about undersea diving adventure, The Sunken Gold is a story of human persistence, bravery, and patriotism.Mes Combats
By Col. René Fonck, Maréchal Ferdinand Foch. 2017
« Le simple récit de ses combats, véritables exploits épiques accomplis dans les airs, donne un exemple des activités, des…
énergies, des vertus, mises en jeux dans les luttes nationales de nos jours. Par là cet ouvrage indique aux générations à venir la hauteur morale où elles doivent monter leur préparation à la guerre, ce qui est, dans la paix, leur devoir. » Préface du Maréchal Foch.Call to Arms: The British Army, 1914-18
By Charles Messenger. 2005
This is a comprehensive account of how the British Army coped with and adapted to the enormous challenges and pressures…
of the First World War -- the first major continental war that the army had had to fight for almost a hundred years. Following the course of the War, both on the Western Front and in other theatres, Charles Messenger tells how the British Army managed the challenges of command, training, technology and new weapons of war. He examines officer selection, medicine, discipline, the manpower crisis of 1918, the integration of women into the forces and many other topics. Based on years of original research, this will become the standard work of reference on the organization and administration of the biggest army Britain has ever put into the field.Apollinaire in the Great War (1914-18)
By David Hunter. 2015
A major literary figure in pre-war Paris, Guillaume Apollinaire volunteered for war in 1914, trained as an artilleryman and was…
posted in April 1915 to the Champagne front in northern France, participating in the bloody but little-known offensive that September and then moving into the front line as an infantry officer, before being wounded in March 1916 and invalided out of active service. Back in Paris, Apollinaire plunged back into the activities of the capital's artistic avant-garde, meanwhile publishing poetry, prose and plays that were deeply influenced by his involvement in the conflict. He died on 9 November 1918, two days before the Armistice, a victim of the influenza pandemic, but with a literary reputation secured, as well as a certain fame for coining the term 'Surrealism'. This book draws heavily on Apollinaire's writings to tell the story of his war years, within the wider context of the French experience of the Great War. In this period, Apollinaire also wrote hundreds of letters, the bulk of them to two women: Louise de Coligny, a flighty socialite of aristocratic origin, and Madeleine Pagès, a young schoolteacher. In these letters he poured out his passionate feelings for both in often highly erotic poetry and prose, as well as giving detailed descriptions of his life as a front-line soldier.