THE DISABILITY EXPERIENCE

An overview of disability history and culture.

Leavitt, herself legally blind, begins by contrasting the impairment-focused medical model of disability with the social model, which incorporates the challenges that people with disabilities encounter in everyday life. Using person-first language, she applies the social model to a vast array of topics. Subjects include the treatment of people with disabilities throughout history; the meaning of disabled culture; assistive technologies and adaptations; and challenges faced by contemporary people with disabilities in work, school, and medical settings, such as ignorance, inaccessibility, and discrimination. She bolsters her exploration of physical, sensory, and intellectual disabilities with statistics enumerating disabled populations in the United States and Canada. Sidebars highlight athletes, artists, and entrepreneurs with disabilities, and expressive cartoons illustrate common scenarios; both photos and art feature ethnic diversity. The author’s personal anecdotes provide additional insight. Unfortunately, Leavitt occasionally overgeneralizes: Although people may find learning braille challenging, she asserts that she learned it at age 10, “so how hard can it be?” and the preference of many autistic people for identity-first language is not addressed. However, her candid discussions of contemporary issues, such as low employment rates and medically assisted dying, are nuanced and hard-hitting, and her acknowledgement of disability in the LGBTQ+ community is refreshing. She ends on a hopeful note, offering ways for nondisabled readers to advocate for people with disabilities.

A candid introduction to the multifaceted experiences of people with disabilities.