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Disability Pride, 3D heritage and climate stories - your July reads |
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Hello there! ⛱️
We’re halfway through July and what better time to pause and reflect on the voices and experiences that challenge our understanding of cultural heritage? This month marks Disability Pride Month, so we are celebrating the diverse perspectives and contributions of disabled communities, highlighting how they continue to enrich the ways we remember, share and experience culture.
Join us as we discover the stories of women with disabilities whose courage and resilience helped shape activism and public life, and explore the rich linguistic traditions behind sign languages. We are excited to share some updates about TwinIt! Part II, our collection of 3D models from Europe and beyond. Last but not least, explore our Climate Action Award winners.
Enjoy our July selection of reads and get creative with our new 3D models! |
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Women with disabilities who changed history |
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While we celebrate the achievements of remarkable women, the stories that shaped them often remain untold. This is especially true for women with disabilities, whose vital contributions to political, social and cultural change have long been overlooked. Through the lives of four extraordinary women from different centuries and countries, we explore the powerful intersections of feminist, queer and disability histories across Europe and beyond.
Meet Rosa May Billinghurst – British suffragette and women's rights activist. Surviving polio as a child left her unable to walk. She refused to let her state limit her activism and used crutches or a tricycle to take part in demonstrations. As a member of Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), she faced police brutality multiple times, but her resilience never wavered. Meet Barbara Jordan – lawyer, educator, politician, and Civil Rights leader who made history as the first Black woman from the South elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Recognised by the National Archives as the first LGBTQ+ woman in Congress, she overcame significant barriers to lead the fight for equality. Despite battling multiple sclerosis later in her life, her legacy endured, culminating in her historic burial as the first Black American to have been buried in the Texas State Cemetery. These are just two of the four remarkable women whose stories we’re sharing. Discover how their lives, shaped by different challenges, are united by resilience, courage and a commitment to change. Read the full feature to meet the other two pioneers.
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Sign languages - giving voice to the voiceless |
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Did you know that one of the first manual alphabets for deaf people was created as early as the 16th century by a Spanish Benedictine monk? Sign languages are visual languages using hand gestures and body movements to communicate. They are rich linguistic systems with unique histories, structures and thriving communities. Today, over 200 distinct sign languages and dialects are spoken around the world. Discover how sign languages evolved over the centuries and explore the role they continue to play in shaping communication and identity within deaf communities.
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Europe's heritage in 3D: explore, reuse, create |
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A retreating glacier. An 18th-century shipwreck. Beethoven's viola. One of the world’s earliest surviving coaches. Zoom in, explore and reuse 92 different 3D models from all across the EU and beyond. Browse through a remarkable collection of 3D cultural heritage assets, whether for for education, research or simply out of curiosity. One example of what’s possible: software company Artetra used Europeana’s APIs to build a fully immersive virtual exhibition from the same 3D collection, letting anyone walk through and interact with the 3D models in a shared digital space.
Want to try it yourself? On 3 August, Europeana, Artetra and other experts will show you how to turn 3D cultural heritage assets into your own interactive experiences – from games to virtual environments.
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Europeana Creative Climate Action Award 2026 |
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Nature and the environment have been frequent themes in writing and poetry throughout the years. Today, there are a growing number of writers who address the climate crisis theme in their fiction, poetry, essays or other outputs.
The Europeana Climate Action Community acknowledges that climate change is an emergency and believes that cooperative action is required to reverse this momentum. By inviting writers to create new works reflecting or inspired by cultural heritage material, we offer ideas, hopes for our futures, and potential directions for us all to think further about.
See the winning works and the images that inspired them, and explore how creative writing can bring new perspectives to climate action – encouraging conversations about our environment, our future and the role cultural heritage can play in raising awareness.
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