Nationally recognized disability awareness advocate and writer Lydia X. Z. Brown will visit the UO April 27 as the 2018 Disability Awareness Speaker.

The lecture is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be available at 5 p.m. and Brown’s talk begins at 5:30 p.m. in Room 156, Straub Hall.

Brown currently serves as the Massachusetts Developmental Disabilities Council chairperson and lead editor of “All the Weight of Our Dreams,” the first-ever anthology by autistic people of color. Recently, Brown taught disability and social movements at Tufts University.

Brown has been honored by the White House, Washington Peace Center, National Council on Independent Living and Disability Policy Consortium.

The Accessible Education Center organizes the event. The center coordinates an annual event to raise awareness of disability-focused issues across a range of areas that varies each year. 

“We hope that this event will prompt attendees to not only increase their awareness of disability justice issues but also think more critically about disability as an identity and a central experience in many people's lives,” event organizers Kelsey Kuperman and Darien Combs said in a joint statement.

For more information, visit the Accessible Education Center website.