Redefining Disability

The reality of disability―of what it means to be disabled―has primarily been written by non-disabled people. Disability and disabled individuals are often described with pity, presented as burdens, or are background figures in larger non-disabled narratives. Redefining Disability challenges the outsider-dominated approach to disability by centering the disabled experience.

This edited volume, featuring all disabled authors and creators, combines traditional academic works with personal reflections, visual art, and poetry. These works address disability and race, sexuality and disability, disability cultures, accommodation, self-diagnosis, and how we manage the obstacles ableist institutions place in our way. The authors address a variety of disabilities, including sensory, chronic pain, mobility, developmental disorders, and mental illness. It is through these testimonies that we hope to redefine disability on our terms; to clearly state that disability is not a bad word, and that all disabled lives have value.

Redefining Disability is interdisciplinary, with broad application for undergraduate courses, graduate seminars, or to read for pleasure. Each entry contains discussion questions and/or activities for educators to use in the classroom.

Paul D. C. Bones, Ph.D. (2015), University of Oklahoma, is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Texas Woman’s University. He has published articles and book chapters on disability, hate crime, and criminology. This includes a recent article on access and accommodation during COVID-19 published in Socius (2021).

Jessica Smartt Gullion, Ph.D. (2002), Texas Woman's University, is the Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences and Associate Professor of Sociology at that university. She has published extensively in medical sociology and qualitative research methodology, including the award-winning Diffractive Ethnography: Social Sciences and the Ontological Turn (Routledge, 2018).

Danielle Barber, M.S. (2018), Texas Woman's University, is a doctoral candidate in Sociology at that university. She conducts research on health and illness and on disability.