There has been a surge in disability activism since 2017 through ground-level organizing, cyber protests and activism, popular media coverage (Time Magazine, MSNBC, Huffington Post), and expanding scholarly literature positioning disability rights as civil rights. An example of online efforts is the Disability Visibility Project, which pushes viral hashtags (#cripthevote, #iamapreexistingcondition, #thisiswhatdisabilitylookslike), demands for equal access to rights and services, and reclaims/reasserts identity. 

Wesleyan University

Disability Justice is a framework that was developed in the mid-2000s by disabled people of color, disabled queer people, and disabled queer people of color, including Patty Berne, Leroy Moore, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, and Mia Mingus and groups including Sins Invalid, the Disability Justice Collective, and Azola Story.

Disability Justice 

Andrews, Erin E. ; Forber-Pratt, Anjali J. ; Mona, Linda R. ; Lund, Emily M. ; Pilarski, Carrie R. ; Balter, Rochelle
WASHINGTON: American Psychological Association
Rehabilitation psychology, 2019-05, Vol. 64 (2), p.111-118

Reference for #SaytheWord: A Disability Culture Commentary on the Erasure of “Disability”

1. Intersectionality
2. Leadership of Those Most Impacted
3. Anti-Capitalist Politics
4. Cross-Movement Organizing
5. Recognizing Wholeness
6. Sustainability
7. Commitment to Cross-Disability Solidarity
8. Interdependence
9. Collective Access
10.Collective Liberation

10 Principles of Disability Justice 

Price notes that Disability Justice is often cited as a key framework in Disability Studies and Critical Disability Studies often without much thought by the programs within academia that are claiming to do Disability Justice work. Price holds that while Critical Disability Studies, Disability Studies and Disability Justice can overlap, that the Disability Justice movement is and has always been separate from academia. Price doesn't mean by this that there are no Disability Justice activists that are affiliated with universities or that DS and CDS programs cannot uphold the values of Disability Justice, but that while DS programs are primarily situated within academe and meant to benefit people within academia, Disability Justice is primarily situated within communities that are not sponsored by or considered within academia. 

Disability Justice and (Critical) Disability Studies

Digital Activism

Engagement with disability as a social and political category and embodiment rather than as a solely personal or medical experience.

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