Changeling R&D

I am in the early stages of a new body of work exploring the parallels between changeling folklore and modern disability narratives.

This research examines how both historical and contemporary societies have pathologised and “othered” disabled people, using stories, labels, and moral frameworks to cast difference as deception, danger, or defect.

Drawing on printmaking techniques such as linocut and monoprinting, and referencing the stark visual language of medieval woodcuts, I am investigating how changeling myths mirror enduring narratives about liminality, bodily change, and distrust. The project looks beyond British folklore, tracing similar tales across the world, and considering the violent realities behind these myths.

In many historical accounts, so-called “changeling children” were almost certainly disabled children-lives dismissed, feared, or erased through brutal rituals to drive out or uncover the malevolent imposter. Through this lens, changeling folklore can be reframed as an early form of hate crime. My aim is to reclaim and rewrite these stories from a crip perspective, imagining alternative tellings that centre survival, agency, and empowerment.