Murray State's Cinema International presents the 2020 documentary Crip Camp this week. Directed, written, and co-produced by Nicole Newnham and James LeBrecht, the film follows the story of a summer camp for people with disabilities in upstate New York before Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990. Daniel Hurt speaks to Dr. Thérèse St. Paul, Cinema International director, and Dr. Rebecca Rosen, associate professor of English, ahead of the screenings sponsored by Murray State's Department of English and Special Topics.
"The film basically talks about how members of the early friends of 'Camp Gen Ed,' a camp for children and young adults with disabilities that was run in upstate New York from 1951 to 1977," Rosen begins. "They really formed a close community." The documentary follows how the community "informed their disability rights activism from the 1970s through the 1990s. Many of the people involved in the documentary are those campers or counselors."
"It was a camp designed to give people with disabilities, mainly physical, but not only, the camp experience of the outdoors and summer camp activities that children who were deemed normative would have had," she continues. "In its original site, there were lots of outdoor games. There was boating, people lived in bunks, and it allowed children and teenagers with disabilities to have the kind of pseudo-independent summer camp experience that other children were afforded."
Rosen says the film's crew had deep personal connections to Camp Gen Ed, including the film's director, James LeBrecht, and sound engineer and blind disability rights activist, Judith Human. Both LeBrecht and Human were involved with the camp in their younger years.
Camp Gen Ed existed when landmark legislation like the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 had yet to be passed. This law added protections similar to those in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and extended them to outlaw discrimination based on disability. It also required that employers provide "reasonable accommodations" to employees with disabilities and imposed accessibility requirements in public spaces.
St. Paul says these accommodations and legal protections are less common in Europe than in the United States. She thinks the fact that people with disabilities advocated for their rights was fascinating. "Coming from Europe, it is an amazing step forward, which I always assumed came because of the Vietnam War that brought awareness to a lot of young military people who came back injured. That spearheaded this Disability Act. That's what I thought. But I realized here that it was much more profound."
"What fascinated me is that it came from the disabled community itself to do something about it," St. Paul continues. "And also the shocking revelations that back in the day, anybody with a disability, no matter if it was physical or other, were glommed together and marginalized. After this came the ramps, and I think America is really at the forefront of this. When you go to Europe, they're not there yet."
Rosen says she hopes that people see Crip Camp as an entertaining film that discusses serious issues, including discrimination and overcoming challenges. "When we often talk about issues in public health, and in terms of disability studies, we see stories of suffering and, of course, survival. But they're not often told with as much humor [and hopefulness] as this one." Rosen says that Crip Camp does a good job of providing a "lived experience" of the camp participants by including footage of the campers as children, teenagers, and adults.
Murray State's Cinema International presents Crip Camp on Thursday, March 28, and Saturday, March 30. Both screenings begin at 7:30 pm in Faculty Hall, room 208, on Murray State University's main campus. The screenings and post-film discussions are free and open to the public.
For more information on the MSU Cinema International program, including upcoming films and how to donate, visit its website.
