Challenge the norm with accessible practices (SBLTN Lab Notes 045)
Podcast chat with Brooke Monaghan: Steps you can take right away toward accessible practices, my journey to design, and varied interests as a super-power
IN THE MARGINS
The substitute teacher is in! The cart with the TV has been rolled out!
We’re taking a break from your regular class schedule of “Lab Notes” and bringing you a blast from the past (with a side of humble brag).
The treat? My annoying voice haha I got to chat with Brooke Monaghan about how to challenge industry norms while making your work more accessible, my journey to design, and varied interests as a super-power.
Below you’ll find clips, action tips, and timestamped highlights. You can listen to the full episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or on Brooke’s website.
And 3 accessibility cheers for Brooke having a transcript for this episode!
“I really think that awareness is great, 100% for it, but then after people are aware, then what? And I think that for accessibility, people tend to feel overwhelmed or confused at first when they hear it. They'll think automatically, physical accessibility, like wheelchairs and canes, or they'll think I'm gonna get sued if I'm not accessible. So just even thinking about the topic feels daunting, especially if you're a business owner. So I started to think of what are some ways like, bring that overwhelm down? How can people feel like I can take a small step towards something and really make an impact?” (14:36)
If you like to time-travel, here are some highlights:
05:41 - Get all up in my personal biz with my journey from art and philosophy to graphic design
08:12 - My shift toward focusing on inclusion and accessibility
13:25 - Turning inherent curiosity into challenging the design community and industries
14:36 - The impact of accessibility being left out of conversations about diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI)
17:56 - The financial cost of accessible practices and shifting to an “access as care” mindset
22:48 - Embracing vulnerability, fucking up along the way and recognizing intention and effort
29:00 - Steps you can take right away toward building, and sustaining, digital accessibility practices (aka the low-hanging fruit that can easily be implemented)
38:23 - Embracing varied interests as a super-power and the benefits of showing up as your full self to your work (designers, y’all know the Specialist vs Generalist debate well)
47:42 - Parting ‘words of wisdom’
“Once DEI became the hot thing, I realized that accessibility was kind of left out of the conversation. People were talking about the common things of ethnic and cultural diversity, they're talking about gender expression, they're talking about neurodivergence, but I was like, okay, accessibility, where's that at?
And so, being the way that my mind works, it always wants to blend things and mash things together. That's when I really started thinking about the accessibility and design part. A lot of designers try to make it all academic and highbrow about creative strategy and all this and all that. But at the end of the day, it's about people. And people have needs, so we need to address them.” (16:10)
Cheatsheet for the peeps
You know that little 29-minute timestamp mentioning steps you can take right away? Well, gatekeeping is whack so here ya go!
Add captions to your videos
Create transcripts for your podcast (tip: a script can be repurposed)
Capitalize each word in your hashtags on social media platforms
Check the color contrast in your graphics
Use plain language and/or a clear writing style for general public content (obviously there’s a time and place for the fancy academic or niche stuff, like conferences or industry publications)
Got any questions about the steps above or have thoughts from the episode? Reply or comment below!
“I think, I don't know, I feel like all the DEI and accessibility stuff can be really heavy sometimes. And so I just want to remind people that like, just chill, it's okay. Like, you know, we're all on this giant rock, floating in nothingness for a blip of a time. As horrible as humans and everything can be sometimes, there's some really awesome moments. So just try to be a decent person. Leave people and places and planets and animals better than how they were when you found them, and just try to have fun.” (47:50)
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Signing off from the Starship SBLTN,
Laneen (Pronouns: she/they)
HEARD IN THE HALLWAYS
Brooke has this little thang thang about to start called The Aligned Business Portal
🖊️ Word of the Day: Assiduous is a formal word that means “showing great care, attention, and effort.”
🎧 Listening: Music from ice instruments
You do such a great job breaking accessibility down in simplified pieces. You are a HUGE reason why I've pushed through the overwhelm of where to start when it comes to creating more accessible content and I will be forever thankful for that!