Welcome to the DSROI 2024 Project Spotlight
Launched in 2024, the DSROI Project Spotlight is a new initiative to showcase the creativity, insight, and transformative work of participants from the Disability and Sexuality Rights Online Institute. Each year, participants submit a final project element that reflects their learning and vision. These are reviewed by the institute’s faculty, who nominate select projects for recognition based on their originality, clarity, innovation, and impact.
The projects featured here represent the inaugural selection. These are remarkable examples of bold storytelling, community-rooted practice, and critical imagination. We look forward to growing this archive in the years to come, celebrating the evolving contributions of DSROI alumni and amplifying their work to wider audiences.
Soamtic Daundala
Muhammad Rhaka Katresna
Daundala Somatic uses skeletonized leaves as canvases, symbolizing nature and emotion, to facilitate emotional release for activists. A December 1st, 2024, session included leaf preparation, drawing, and reflection, fostering natural connection. Key themes emerged: valuing personal time, self-organization, personal space, strength in details, and consistency. These insights promote mental well-being and effective advocacy. The project emphasizes transforming artistic expression into actionable advocacy, blending expertise and compassion to inspire positive change for both individuals and the planet. This approach encourages mindful engagement with art to amplify advocacy messages.
Reimagining disability justice in the Global South: A Haitian perspective
Jo-Ann Garnier
This paper explores the relevance of disability justice in Haiti, emphasizing the need for a decolonial, community-centered approach that moves beyond Western-centric disability rights frameworks. It examines how colonial legacies, cultural stigma, economic exclusion, nd natural disasters shape the experiences of persons with disabilities in Haiti. The paper proposes reimagining disability justice through interdependence (lakou system), cross-movement solidarity, leadership development, and co-creation of policies. It highlights gaps in assistive technology, care networks, and governance and calls for economic empowerment, storytelling, and inclusive policymaking to foster a locally driven and transformative justice framework for persons with disabilities.
Unmasking the Self, Unmasking the System
Shirin Arianna Reza Elahi (with the contributions of Greta Vaiarelli)
"Unmasking the Self, Unmasking the System is a raw, symbolic video artwork that explores the pain and resistance embedded in unmasking as an autistic and non binary person. Shot through mirrors before shifting to direct focus, the video follows a figure stripping naked and peeling-away; quot; fake skin; quot; confronting both neurodivergent and gendered expectations. In the final act, discarded layers are burned using a rally torch—an act of defiance against systemic oppression. The work challenges the idea that compliance protects the marginalized and asserts that true reclamation comes through radical rejection of imposed identities."
IN
Sarah Magni
A multi-media collage and poem exploring the prefix "in" and its dichotomy of violence and tool for resistance IN disabled communities, particularly those INstitutionalized