Family and Disability Activism

Pamela Block is a Professor of Anthropology at Western University. She is coeditor of Occupying Disability: Critical Approaches to Community, Justice, and Decolonizing Disability and coauthor of Allies and Obstacles: Disability Activism and Parents of Children with Disabilities (Temple).Allison C. Carey is a Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Shippensburg University. She is the author of On the Margins of Citizenship: Intellectual Disability and Civil Rights in Twentieth-Century America (Temple) and Disability and the Sociological Imagination, and co-author of Allies and Obstacles: Disability Activism and Parents of Children with Disabilities (Temple).Richard K. Scotch is Professor of Sociology and Public Policy at the University of Texas, Dallas. He is the author of From Good Will to Civil Rights: Transforming Federal Disability Policy (Temple); coauthor of Allies and Obstacles: Disability Activism and Parents of Children with Disabilities (Temple) and Disability Protests: Contentious Politics, 1970–1999; and the coeditor of Disability and Community.

“In an introduction and nine chapters, diverse disabled activists, sometimes in conversation with family members, analyze the complexities of intersectionality. The editors and contributors write about hidden histories of racial-ethnic disability activism; the benefits and limits of cross-ethnic and cross-disability alliances; and the pressures that parents and siblings of disabled people face as they both support their loved ones and strive to normalize or resist the discrimination of medicolegal, educational, and service institutions. Authors, families, and strategies are as diverse as disability itself; Family and Disability Activism is an exciting foray into disability activism’s history, present, and future.” - Faye Ginsburg and Rayna Rapp, authors of Disability Worlds “Family and Disability Activism is a book that proposes dialogue in this moment of division. An excellent expansion of Allies and Obstacles, it is the best short anthology I’ve read on disability justice activism in years. The cross-disability inclusion is on point and needed. As an Afro-Latine Indigenous disabled parent, I appreciate seeing every perspective on what defines family and how disabled activists and parents approach advocating for disabled lives. This book provides hope in a moment of global unrest.” - Kerima Çevik, Disabled Parent Activist, Creator of #AutisticWhileBlack, and Certified Disability Support Broker "Themes of parent-activism and amplifying children’s voices play out in every chapter. The stories bring intersectionality to life as living, breathing, and informing Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, Disability Studies and other fields of research. The book deserves to reach far beyond the disability community.... The book’s poignant final stanza is a rallying call made by disabled young person Erin Compton: ‘In a limitless world, we cannot limit ourselves to one way to speak, read or lead. We just can’t.’ This argues that action can take many forms, and needs to take different forms if it is going to be culturally ‘fitting’ to all communities.... The book hints at a future where future assistance and allyships, as well as obstacles in the path ahead, are unknown. With the various recommended solutions to demolish barriers, there is hope for a future truly beyond obstacles." - Disability & Society