Focusing a definition of disability on "apparent" physical and sensory disabilities overlooks disabilities such as diabetes, asthma and other chronic illnesses that are more common in poor and racialized communities. Definitions of disability that are developed with little attention to the wide spectrum of disability lead to a definition of disability that is overly representative of white people and is unable to fully account for the ways disability  and disability politics manifest within racialized communities and poor communities and their activism.

Definitions of Disability and Exclusion of Racialized  and Poor Communities

Disability Studies and the Disability Rights Movement's definitions of disability have historically focused on physical and sensory disabilities rather than on cognitive disabilities, neurodiversity based disabilities, or chronic illnesses.

University of Wisconsin - Madison

Crip Theorist Alison Kafer defines disability as a political category. Viewing disability as a political category makes it both contested and contestable. Disabled, Mad, sick, and ill people are therefore related through similar societal oppressions they experience because of their nonnormative bodyminds. 

Disability in Crip Theory

Schalk, Sami. Black Disability Politics, New York, USA: Duke University Press, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781478027003

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