Isabelle (she/her) is a second-year PhD student in History at the University of British Columbia. Her research lies at the intersection of Critical Disability Studies, Public Policy Studies, and the history of everyday life.

Tentatively titled “Exceptional Embodiment: Disability Policy in Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, 1878-1914,” Isabelle’s doctoral project explores how disabled individuals, government representatives, and community members constructed and contested the relationship between disabled citizens/subjects/residents and the state through everyday interactions “on the ground.” As such, Isabelle’s work engages with a wide range of sub-disciplines, including disability history, history of the body, policy history, and the history of medicine.

Isabelle is a co-Convener of the Working Group on Disability Studies within the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. She is also an Affiliate and a former Graduate Student Fellow at UBC’s Centre for European Studies.

In addition to her historical research, Isabelle is interested in Canadian disability policy, global disability studies, and current affairs in the Balkans. Isabelle is the research assistant for the PROUD Project, a research initiative affiliated with the University of Toronto, that studies disability and employment.

• Critical Disability Studies
• Disability History
• Gender History
• Balkan History
• Late Ottoman History
• Central European History

Refereed Articles in Student Journals

• “Hostages of History: North Macedonia, Bulgaria, and the Hazards of EU Accession.” Eurasiatique 11 (April 2022). https://eurasiatique.ca/2022/04/03/hostages-of-history-north-macedonia-bulgaria-and-the-hazards-of-eu-accession/
• “Re-Heating the Chicken Kiev: A Reassessment of President Bush’s Infamous Speech.” The Attaché: The Undergraduate Journal of International Relations at the University of Toronto 21 (April 2021): 24-33. https://attachejournal.ca/publications/

Non-Academic Articles

• With Chloë G. K. Atkins, “How employers can tackle misconceptions about disabled people in the workplace.” The Conversation, October 9, 2023. https://theconversation.com/how-employers-can-tackle-misconceptions-about-disabled-people-in-the-workplace-210769

Non-Refereed Podcasts

• Guest host for “Episode 40: Disability History in Eastern Europe: A Roundtable Discussion.” March 2023. Disability History Association Podcast.  https://dishist.org/?page_id=735
• Broadcastability Season 2. The PROUD Project, University of Toronto. September 2023-Present. https://www.broadcastability.ca/
• Broadcastability Season 1. The PROUD Project, University of Toronto. September 2021-August 2022. Eight episodes. https://www.broadcastability.ca/
• The BC Studies Podcast: An Introduction to Scholarly Podcasting. March 2021. Four episodes. Produced for BC Studies. https://bcstudies.com/resources/scholarly-podcasts/
• The Distant Prayers Podcast. The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies. December 2020-January 2021. Seven episodes. https://www.spreaker.com/show/the-distant-prayers-podcast

Presentations

• “The Aftermath of Madness: Leaving the Belgrade and Sarajevo Asylums, c.1861-1914.” ASEEES Convention 2024. November 23, 2024. Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies.
• “Josef Prkna Goes to Court: Sick, Injured, and Disabled Workers Seeking Civil Justice in Habsburg-Occupied Bosnia.” Social Histories of Civil Justice, 19-20^th centuries, March 7-8, 2024. University of Vienna, International Workshop in the framework of the FWF Project “Uses of civil justice and social policy in the Habsburg Monarchy, 1873 – 1914.”
• “Disabled by Development: Colonialism, Industrialization, and Disability in Habsburg Bosnia, 1878-1908.” ASEEES 2023 Virtual Convention. October 20, 2023.
• With Chloë G. K. Atkins. “Ecosystems and Expectations: The Social Construction of Livelihood for People Living in Disabling Contexts in 5 Countries (Canada, US, UK, France & Belgium).” Reimagining Livelihoods Forum, Aug. 23-24, 2023. Live Work Well Research Centre, University of Guelph.
• “’Unfit for the Army… Unfit for Life’: Militarism, Masculinity, and Disability in Serbia, 1878-1912.” Towards a history of disability in Eastern Europe, June 30-July 2, 2023. University of Indiana Europe Gateway.
• “Scholarly Spolia: Gathering the Building Blocks for a History of Disability in the Late Ottoman Empire.” Seminar in Ottoman and Turkish Studies, The Late Ottoman Empire: A Discussion of History and Historiography, April 19, 2023. Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, University of Toronto.
• “Visions of Unity and Disunity in the Open Balkan Initiative.” CERES Graduate Student Conference 2022. Panel: “Balkan Futurities: Histories, Visions, Barriers.” University of Toronto.
• “Balkan Ouroboros: “There Is Such a People” and the Pattern of Bulgarian Populism.” Political Science Graduate Student Conference 2022. Carleton University. April 20, 2022.

Scholarly Association Affiliations

• Disability History Association
• Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies
• Central European History Society

Dr. Eagle Glassheim