Carly Findlay- a woman with a red face and short dark curly hair, tied up in a colourful scarf. She’s wearing a pomegranate print dress over a grey top. She’s smiling. Yellow text on a blue background reads All about Carly Findlay: Writer, Speaker, Disability and Appearance Activist. There are yellow wavy lines on the top and bottom of image and yellow and red dots above Carly's head.

All about Carly Findlay: Writer, Speaker, Disability and Appearance Activist

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Introduction

Carly Findlay OAM is an award-winning writer, speaker and appearance activist. Carly works part time as Melbourne Fringe’s Access and Inclusion Coordinator. She organised the history-making Access to Fashion – a Melbourne Fashion Week event featuring disabled models. She was named as one of Australia’s most influential women in the 2014 Australian Financial Review and Westpac 100 Women of Influence Awards. She lives in Melbourne, Australia and identifies as a proud disabled woman.

In this article you’ll find information about her books Say Hello and Growing Up Disabled in Australia, as well as articles, webinars and podcasts.

You can find Carly here:

Read Books

Say Hello: How I became my own fangirl; a memoir and manifesto on difference, acceptance, self-love and belief

Carly Findlay, HarperCollins AU, 2019Book cover featuring woman with red face and shirt dark curly hair, smiling. She’s wearing a pink floral top and bright orange skirt. The orange text reads Say Hello, and black text reads Carly Findlay. How I became the fangirl of my own story - a memoir and manifesto on difference, acceptance, self love and belief.

In Carly’s words –

“I have written a book. It’s called Say Hello. HarperCollins is my publisher. The book is a memoir – with anecdotes from my life to date, as well as thoughts and observations on ableism, media representation and beauty privilege. There’s advice to readers with and without ichthyosis, facial difference and disability. It encourages hope and disability pride. The book is called Say Hello because that’s what I want people to do, instead of ignoring me, looking shocked or scared, or making a rude comment about my face. If you enjoy my blog and articles, I think you’ll like my memoir.

There was no one in media or books who looked like me, or to tell me it’s ok to not want to change my appearance, and I didn’t know whether I’d find love – love with another or love for myself. I had to write that book. To be the person Little Carly needed. In Say Hello, I want to show parents who have a disabled child that there is no need to grieve a life lost – because their child is alive and can live a great life with love and support. I want to show readers how to be proud of their identity and their appearance, and love themselves even when the world has told them they have to hide.”

Representation matters. I hope this book is the start of more people with ichthyosis telling their own story – to shift the focus from the exploitative media we are seeing a lot of. Representation matters because shapes the way ichthyosis is seen, and lets people with ichthyosis see themselves. Disability literature must be disability-led. – Carly Findlay, Source

Access Book

Watch Videos

Say Hello book launch

Part Memoir, Part Manifesto with Carly Findlay

Your Story Matters: Intro to Memoir

Growing Up Disabled in Australia

Edited by Carly Findlay, Black Inc Books, 2021

Image: a book cover. It’s an abstract drawing featuring pink, yellow and purple coloured scribbles on a real background. “Growing Up Disabled in Australia” is in white capital handwritten style text in the middle of the book, and “Carly Findlay” in capital yellow text at the bottom.

A rich collection of writing from those negotiating disability in their lives – a group whose voices are not heard often enough.

“One in five Australians has a disability. And disability presents itself in many ways. Yet disabled people are still underrepresented in the media and in literature. In Growing Up Disabled in Australia – compiled by writer and appearance activist Carly Findlay OAM – more than forty writers with a disability or chronic illness share their stories, in their own words. The result is illuminating.

Contributors include senator Jordon Steele-John, paralympian Isis Holt, Dion Beasley, Sam Drummond, Astrid Edwards, Sarah Firth, El Gibbs, Eliza Hull, Gayle Kennedy, Carly-Jay Metcalfe, Fiona Murphy, Jessica Walton and many more.” Source

Access Book

Watch Video

Growing Up Disabled in Australia

Watch an recorded online event by Better Read than Dead celebrating the release of the book, Growing Up Disabled in Australia featuring Carly Findlay and El Gibbs and other authors.

More

Book Chapters

Women of a Certain Rage

Fremantle Press, 2021Book cover with text overlaying colourful flowers. Text reads Women of a Certain Rage.

Carly’s has a chapter in the book, Women of a Certain Rage, titled ‘Vicarious trauma: I Was You and You Will Be Me’. She writes of her anger on behalf of young children who share her disability, and the invasion of their privacy that she witnesses occurring on social media.

Ableism starts with you.
And it can stop with you, too.

“This book is the result of what happened when Liz Byrski asked 20 Australian women from widely different backgrounds, races, beliefs and identities to take up the challenge of writing about rage. The honesty, passion, courage and humour of their very personal stories is energising and inspiring. If you have ever felt the full force of anger and wondered at its power, then this book is for you.” Source – Fremantle Press

Growing Up African in Australia

Black Inc., 2020

Book cover. Title reads Growing up African in Australia. Edited by Maxine Beneba Clarke. The title is in yellow, red, black and green writing. The image is of a row of African Australian children standing in front of a brick wall under a blue sky. They are wearing colourful clothing.

Carly’s chapter is titled Complex Colour.

#MeToo: Stories from the Australian movement

Picador Australia, 2019#MeToo: Stories from the Australian movement. The #MeToo is in large writing across three quarters of the book cover. It is in black writing with a rainbow of colours shadowing the letters.

Carly Findlay’s piece is on sexual harassment and accountability within disability and activist communities.

Read Articles

It’s not enough just to be included. It’s not enough for accessibility to be the afterthought. It’s not enough for only white disabled people to be visible. It’s not enough to only be hearing from non-intellectually disabled people. It’s not enough for accessibility to only be available on request. It’s not enough for only one type of access provision to exist. It’s not enough to politely laugh exclusion off for fear you might upset the very people who created the ableist structures. It is not enough to only want to conform in non disabled spaces, and not make room in disabled spaces.

I demand access, inclusion and representation for me – and I demand it for all other disabled people, especially those whose voices and faces aren’t often centred, and even when it doesn’t affect me directly. – Carly Findlay, Source

Read more on Carly’s blog.

Watch

Carly Findlay : ‘The more you tell your story, the more courage you get’

Carly Findlay is no stranger to sharing her story online and here she opens up about her experiences on social media. The trolling she’s fought against, her hopes to educate and the positive experiences of bringing people with the skin condition, Ichthyosis, together.

Talking with Imani Barbarin for Alter State

Carly chats with Imani Barbarin, a Black American Disabled woman, about disability activism and art.

Centre the voices of people with disability

I’m a proud disabled woman and I will speak about it… The personal is political… You will not silence this part of my identity.

Carly Findlay – appearance activist, writer and speaker – reminded us at Progress 2017 that “disability is the forgotten part of diversity,” and it’s time to step up.

 

 

Listen

Centring disability in the arts with Carly Findlay, ArtsHubbub


Transcript

What can we do to make the arts more accessible? Activist and author Carly Findlay joins us to discuss Growing Up Disabled in Australia, featuring over 40 disabled artists. She talks about eliminating the barriers to accessible arts, and about the media guidelines she created for reporting on disabled people. A full transcript of the podcast is available on our website.

Women with Disabilities Australia – WWDA Youth Podcast

Text overlaying a portrait of Carly Findlay. Text reads WWDA Youth Podcast #5 - Carly Findlay, Disability and Identity. A purple abstract shape overlays Carly and the text. There is a white audio signal under the text and the WWDA logo.Transcript

Jade and Carly talk about Carly’s journey to becoming an activist, what it means to identify as having a disability, the impact of social media on the lives of people with disability and more!

Support Carly

If you have benefited from Carly Findlay’s work show your support via her Patreon.

Carly Findlay can present on disability and appearance diversity topics including access and inclusion training, disability training for the media, and also keynote speeches based on her own lived experience, plus workshops on social media, writing online, disability in literature, and memoir. She has more than 10 years experience working in the media and building her own brand on social media. 

She’s always interested in writing, speaking or consulting for your organisation. Contact her for her rates.

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