månadsarkiv: juni 2019

Third day of the Nordic Aphasia Conference 2019 #nordicaphasia @NAC2019Turku

Today’s theme at the Nordic Aphasia Conference is multilingualism (i.e. people speaking two or more languages). Treating people with aphasia who are multilingual is a real challenge!

The presenters, Mira Goral and Monica Norvik, raised some truly intriguing questions. How does the multilingual brain actually work? How do you know what to assess? If you need an interpreter during therapy, does the interpreter know enough about aphasia (and aphasia therapy) not to correct what the person is saying?

Since I am focused on issues of social media use, I found it particularly interesting that Monica said that social media may be used to get a picture of the person’s pre-onset use of the different language. The videos we make and post online thus become a tool for therapy, long after they were created.

The speaker to close the conference was Tom Sather from the USA. His talk was about ”flow”, or what it means to ”be absorbed in the moment” when living with aphasia. I have never come across anyone interested in this field before, and it is always fascinating to learn about new topics. He made an important point about a problem with ”aphasia friendly” material – do we over-simplify material to the extent that we take away the challenge?

Kati Renvall summed up the days by thanking everybody involved. Everybody did a very good job! I really enjoyed attending.

Finally, the next hosting city of the Nordic Aphasia Conference was revealed. It will be in Iceland! Yay! Reykjavik 2021, here we come!

Second day of the Nordic Aphasia Conference 2019 #nordicaphasia @NAC2019Turku

After a nice welcome reception yesterday evening, and a good nights sleep, the Nordic Aphasia Conference continued today.

Like yesterday, the programme was filled with interesting presentations. I loved listening to Annie Hill and Johanna Naamanka about telerehabilitation, to Ulla Konnerup, Jane Marshall (remember EVA Park?) and Matti Lehtihalmes about therapy in virtual reality settings, to Madeleine Cruice about social media accessibility and to Katie Monnelly about the acutal technology use among people with aphasia. It is obvious that technology is an important topic within the aphasia field. Katie Monnelly concluded by saying: Get it done!

Annie Hill talking about telerehabilitation in Australia

Annie Hill talking about telerehabilitation in Australia

Ulla Konnerup talking about virtual worlds and aphasia

Ulla Konnerup talking about virtual worlds and aphasia

Katie Monnelly talking about how people with aphasia use technology

Katie Monnelly talking about how people with aphasia use technology

I also had my own presentation today. I talked about stories of self and the need to renegotiate them when acuiring aphasia. My point is that multimodal literacy practices gives a person with aphasia a choice of what to include in those stories, i.e. they increase their narrative agency.

I must say that I am a bit overwhelmed over all the positive feedback I got after the presentation. I think I am going to print the mentions on Twitter and put them on my office wall. They will make any struggling day easier, I am sure! Thank you, all.

Helena Taubner föreläser om sin avhandling

I am presenting my PhD thesis at the NAC2019 conference. (Picture stolen from @NAC2019Turku on Twitter)

 

First day of the Nordic Aphasia Conference 2019 #nordicaphasia @nac2019turku

I am excited to be attending the Nordic Aphasia Conference 2019! This year, the conference is hosted by the University of Turku, Finland. (Last time the NAC was in Copenhagen, remember?)

Interesting presentations, inspiring conversations, new ideas and lots of nice people!

Kati Renvall opening the Nordic Aphasia Conference 2019 in Turku

Kati Renvall opening the Nordic Aphasia Conference 2019 in Turku

I especially enjoyed catching up with professor Madeleine Cruice from City, University of London during the poster session. Her work has been so inspiring to me, and I really like meeting her at conferences like this one.

Camilla Olsson from Uppsala University presenting a poster

Camilla Olsson from Uppsala University presenting a poster

Among the oral presentations, I was most inspired by Becky Moss and Abi Roper, both from City, University of London. They are both interested in writing processes of people with aphasia (which is not very common), and since that’s very close to my own project it really inspires me. I am definitly going to stay posted about their projects.

Becky Moss presented findings from a study about facilitating writing through voice recognition software, and there were some truly heart warming stories within her material. Being able to write (again) is not merely a question of putting letters together, but more importantly about keeping a story of self going and maintaining relationships.

Camilla Olsson from Uppsala University presenting a poster

Becky Moss (City, University of London) talking about writing and aphasia

Abi Roper (and a group of others, including people with aphasia) is working on a project about helping people with aphasia expressing themselves online (the INCA project). Part of the project is developing an app for ”Blackout poetry”. The app, called MakeWrite, is meant to stimulate writing in a fun and poetric way, and it is free to download. I can’t wait to try it!

Abi Roper giving a presentation about the INCA project and the MakeWrite app

Abi Roper giving a presentation about the INCA project and the MakeWrite app

The welcome reception starts in a short while, so the conversations will continue there!