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  • Article

Surviving sex work on the streets

In care at four, on the streets at nine, Charmaine has had a traumatic journey to reach life as it is now: no drugs, no sex work, looking after her mum, and enjoying her grandchildren. Here she writes honestly about her past.

  • Article

The ‘undesirable epileptic’

Abused in her marriage for being 'a sick woman', Aparna Nair looked to history to make sense of the response to her epilepsy. She discovered how centuries of fear and discrimination were often endorsed by science and legislation.

  • Article

Disability, education and prejudice

In the 1960s and 1970s, thalidomide survivors had to fight for a proper education. If they weren’t brought up in institutions, they were often viewed as objects of curiosity, encountering verbal and sometimes physical abuse, both at school and in the world beyond.

  • Article

Building resilience in a racist world

With the resurgence of racism in today’s UK, Louisa Adjoa Parker reflects on the trauma of growing up in a racist society and explores how victims could begin to heal.

All stories (27)

Images

  • A man injects drugs into his arm as he leans back with his eyes shut against a wall; a man sitting beside a grave clutching a photograph of a woman and child; a warning about the dangers of drug abuse and AIDS by Programa Compañeros. Colour lithograph, ca. 1995.
  • Two children making a sandcastle by the sea out of which looms a sinister looking man with a camera around his neck, a yellow hat who brandishes green dollar notes; a yellow-eyed hairy beast lurks behind him; with Sinhalese lettering; a warning about child sex tourism and AIDS prevention issued by Peace (Protecting Environment and children Everywhere). Colour lithograph, ca. 1996.
  • A mother who believes that an "Infants preservative" (medicine for infants) will preserve her child from danger in a collapsing house. Coloured lithograph, 183-.
  • The brahmin, sitting in a tree, keeps the children of Vessantara tied up all night, and in the morning takes them on the road. Watercolour.
  • An unhappy young child hung on a wall by his nurse, who has gone dancing. Coloured lithograph by H. Daumier, 1843.
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