![]() ![]() Nielsen, who teaches history and women’s studies at the University of Wisconsin Green Bay, says that historians have plumbed the expansion of democracy through race, class, and gender, and now “t is time to do the same for disability.”Ĭonsider that women, no minority we, were all once thought “disabled,” according to Nielsen. “A Disability History of the United States” (Beacon, 2012) raised my consciousness so often I got dizzy. We call excuses “lame.”īut language is just one of countless obstacles here. We say people are deaf to nuance and blind to possibilities. It’s shocking once you listen for it, there’s disability negativity everywhere. Can’t stand or speak for yourself without help or at all? You are lesser. But now, reading all I’ve read, it’s clicked that we, constantly, unthinkingly, equate personal value with full physical independence. Have you ever told someone, for instance, to “stand on your own two feet” or “speak for yourself?” I sure have. ![]() As an able-bodied person, it’s plain scary to review books on physical disabilities. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |