Bodymind is a term coined by Margaret Price to refer to the inextricable nature of the body and the mind, in particular noting that they cannot be understood or theorized about separately.

Bodyminds

On a national level, disability rights and services are being systematically rolled back, with disability erasure being particularly threatening in this context. Laws such as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA), Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA), the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA), and Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) are essential to survival for disabled people. Systemic rollbacks have included jeopardizing access to medical care and education opportunities. Despite being the largest minority group in the United States, disabled people are significantly underrepresented among voters.

Legislative Threats

Nondisabled psychologists can become allies by supporting efforts to normalize the word “disability”, recognizing and speaking out against problematic language and euphemisms, recognizing and speaking out against inspiration porn, and understanding the importance of intersectional identity and social justice. In clinical practice, psychologists should honor language preferences in culturally appropriate ways, open dialogue with patients about underlying attitudes and beliefs shaping their terminology preferences, and advocate for systemic advancements to increase disabled access to educational, occupational, and medical resources. Lastly, future research should center disabled perspectives, focus on disability identity, examine collective activism around social justice issues, and study impacts of legislation and policy.

Being an Ally

The theory of Black Disability Politics refers to disability politics expressed through text, speech, ideological platforms, or activist work by Black cultural workers (individuals whose work directly responds to and influences culture). It encompasses how Black individuals engage in Disability Justice and Disability Politics, and it can be understood as an integral intersection of both the Disability Justice movement and the Black liberation movement.

Theory of Black Disability Politics

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

University of Wisconsin - Madison

The differences in norms, lifestyles, and social identities, propagated among disabled individuals. It often forms as a reaction toward past and present attitudes towards disabled communities. It promotes connection, camaraderie, and a shared purpose among those in the community. It also includes a motivation for people with disabilities to address their own civil, social, political, and economic needs

Disability Culture

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 

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

Black Disability Politics

The degree to which an individual culture, be it national, religious, class, education level, or otherwise, has a positive or negative (inclusive or exclusive) response to disabled individuals within their culture. 

Public Attitude Toward Disability

The language and terminology that those within a certain disability group generally prefer. For example, many Deaf individuals prefer to be called "Deaf" or "hard of hearing" rather than "hearing impaired" or "a person who is deaf"

Disability Language

Captioning is the process of displaying text while a video is being played. Typically, the text will be a transcription of the video's audio, noting who is speaking along with sound effects and important musical cues. This helps to make films, television shows, and other video recordings accessible to those who are hard of hearing or deaf.

Captioning

Although the sexual behavior of those with disabilities is often stigmatized or ignored by the public, studies have shown that those with disabilities generally still experience the same physical, sexual, and romantic desires that those without disabilities experience.

Disability and Sexuality

Audio Description is the process of narrating certain actions or details that are normally seen visually, such as what a character is wearing. This process is often provided with films, television shows, stage plays, museums to accommodate people with visual impairments. It is often provided via an alternate audio track on a DVD or a handheld audio player.

Audio Description

Working within disability studies and towards more inclusive educational opportunities requires both humility and immense activism. It is important to acknowledge the work is frequently going to be challenged. 

Public Attitude within the work of Disability 

The formation of an individual's disability identity relies on both social and psycholgocial factors related to acceptance and meaning/purpose. Thus, the development of this identity is dependant on interpersonal (social) and intrapersonal (psychological) awarness. 

Defining Disability Identity Development

Since most children with disabilities live into adulthood, a growing amount of research has been dedicated to analyzing the life course outcomes for these individuals. Studies show that while there are often more negative mental and physical health outcomes for individuals with disabilities, more and more people are experiencing similar life trajectories to their peers. This is due to similar opportunities with fulfilling age appropriate adult social roles and positive life experiences. 

Pathways Toward Positive Psychosocial Outcomes and Mental Health for Youth with Disabilities

Disability advocacy is defined as acting or speaking in ways that align with and protect the rights of people with disabilities. There are many different forms of advocacy and it can occur at multiple different levels. 

Defining Disability Advocacy 



People with disabilities can find it more difficult to eat healthy and be physically active. This might be due to: 
- A lack of healthy food choices.
- Difficulty with chewing or swallowing food, or its taste or texture.
- Medications that can contribute to weight gain, weight loss, and changes in appetite.
- Physical limitations that can reduce a person’s ability to exercise.
- Pain.
- A lack of energy.
- A lack of accessible environments (for example, sidewalks, parks, and exercise equipment) that can enable exercise.
- A lack of resources (for example, money, transportation, and social support from family, friends, neighbors, and community members).

Disability and Obesity

A major critique of the current disability studies discipline relates to its essentialist and binary approach to understanding disability and the subjective disability experience. 

Disability Studies and Intersectionality


A field created from the merger of Disability studies, Black studies, postcolonial studies, and feminist studies  that focuses on the lives of Black disabled people and the relationship between race and disability as systems of privilege and oppression. In particular, there is a focus on how disability has appeared among Black people, how disability has been treated and understood within Black communities, how blackness and disability have been discursively linked in various cultures, and how disability an be understood as an identity experience and political category that has been conceptualized, and approached differently by Black activists and intellectuals than it has been by white activists and how this difference proposes and alternative framework of viewing disability. 

Black Disability Studies

A subsection of disability studies theory, whose name was inspired by queer theory, that emphasizes creating a theoretical approach to disability that looks at how disability functions as an ideology, a paradigm, an epistemology, and a system of oppression in addition to an identity experience.

Crip Theory 

Disability Politics

- The disabled population has a large percentage of children, with one third being children. 
  - Many of these disabilities are preventable, but lack of access to healthcare makes treatment difficult, resulting in 65 percent of disabilities affecting children being preventable. 
  - Even more alarming is the research that 98 percent of children with disabilities in low-income countries (LICs) do not attend school.
- Ten percent of the world's population has a sensory, physical, or intellectual disability. 
- Once taking family members into account, about 25 percent of people in the world are impacted by disabilities.
- Two thirds of all people with disabilities live in LICs. Global disability is rapidly increasing, mainly due to population growth in less developed countries, and this further shows the alarming disparity of disabled populations across the world. 

Statistics of Disabilities Across the World

In 2009, ⅔+ of homeless adults had some disability or mental, substance abuse disorder. However, many adults who are diaabled and homeless qualify for SSI and or SSDI support, which would provide benefits that would help secure housing and get recipients necessary treatment. Though, despite being eligible, many people are homeless do not apply for SSI and SSDI Programs. There has been limited research on initiatives aimed at increasing access and benefits for people with disabilities who are homeless.

Disability and Homelessness

NLTS and NLTS-2 shows a matriculation of students with learning disabilities into postsecondary education rose from 11.4% in 1990 to 34.5% in 2005. These students’ success have been notably limited given a 70% dropout rate, lower GPAs, and enrollment in easier programs compared to their non-disabled counterparts.

Learning Disability and Postsecondary Education

-  the community is very supportive of members that are blind and deaf. 
- There is resources available to support deaf and blind individuals. 
- American sign language (ASL) or augmentative and alternative communication devices (AAC)- communication. 
- Diversity in the deaf community 
- Hearing aids or cochlear implants for hearing 
- sensory deprivation- natural reduction of natural stimuli involving lights or five senses. 
-Deaf and blind students can access deaf school systems and higher levels of education. 

American Deaf and Blind Culture

The relationship between sex and disability has been a subject of study for over two decades. Yet, there remains no clear consensus on how sex influences disability and through which mechanisms this influence occurs. Despite the well-documented higher prevalence of self-reported disability among women compared to men, the effect of sex on disability varies significantly depending on the measures used and the covariates considered. 

The Role of Sex on Disability

When discussing disability, the focus is usually on basic accommodations such as interpreting, captions, or ramps. However, accommodations alone cannot guarantee real access for individuals with disabilities. That's why educators and professionals in schools and related fields must educate students about disabilities, end negative stereotypes, and ensure accessibility for disabled individuals. The goal is to recognize disability as a part of diversity and culture rather than a medical condition based on diagnosis.

Disability Culture at Schools

This research presents real-life knowledge about the connections between disability, sexuality, and gender equality issues in different Asian countries. It looks at the experiences of women and LGBTIQ people with disabilities, and their rights and empowerment. The research aims to help local disabled persons’ organizations and NGOs use human rights laws and work together with academics and human rights advocates. 

Asian Disability Studies

Cerebral palsy is a condition that affects movement and muscle control. It occurs when the brain is damaged before birth, during birth, or in early childhood. This damage makes it difficult for the body to move smoothly and in coordination. Some people with cerebral palsy have trouble walking, while others need help with daily tasks like eating or talking. The condition does not get worse over time, but affects everyone differently. There is no cure, but therapy, treatments, and assistive devices can help people with cerebral palsy live full and independent lives.

Cerebral Palsy

According to the text, the majority of college students who have a disability use social media daily. The average time spent amounts to 3.4 hours a day, this high usage is consistent across different types of disabilities, revealing the trend of social media’s prominent role in the lives of those who participated in the study. Participants had on average 4.8 social media accounts. Approximately 36% used social media primarily for social interaction, 17% for information seeking, and 17% for entertainment.


Social Media Use Is Nearly Universal Among College Students with Disabilities


Students from the study who are labeled as having some kind of disability possessed a wide range in the number of social media accounts they held, some having one account, others having as many as thirteen social media accounts. On average, students maintained around five accounts, which indicates diverse engagement across platforms and does not provide any major insight into social media trends in disabled populations.

Number of Social Media Accounts Varies Widely


The study found that the majority of students they surveyed used social media mostly for social interaction purposes, information seeking and entertainment were secondary purposes. These uses emphasize the significance of human connection regardless of disability status and the importance of being able to access information in their daily lives.

Primary Purposes of Social Media Use Among Students with Disabilities


According to the study findings, the use of social media for educational purposes, such as course-related communication, is linked to stronger social connections and shows an improved readiness for careers. This conclusion suggests that academic use of social media can be beneficial in enhancing outcomes in students with disabilities' college careers.

Social Media Learning Positively Impacts Social Connectedness and Career Preparedness


Students who spend more overall time on social media, regardless of intention or purpose, claimed to experience a lack of social connectedness and overall had lower hope for future employment. It can be said that overuse of social media may hinder social and career development in students with disabilities.

Excessive Time on Social Media Negatively Affects Social Connectedness and Career Hope


Addiction to social media showed a correlation with higher GPA and greater social connectedness, but did not reflect higher preparedness for a career. This shows that the results of social media on students with disabilities are not black and white, there are both positive and negative impacts on the surveyed population. 

Social Media Addiction Shows Mixed Effects


Younger students had higher social media addiction as well as better academic and social outcomes. Female students reported higher hope for work success, suggesting demographic differences do influence experiences.

Demographics Impact Social Media Use and College Outcomes

Statistics show an increase in college enrollment, but in spite of this, the article states that students with disabilities graduate less often and face more obstacles to employment in comparison to other students. 

Students with Disabilities Face Lower Graduation Rates and Career Challenges


Social media use has different influences on academic, social, and career success in students with disabilities. Understanding how social media influences students with disabilities can allow for more effective support strategies to be put into place.

Social Media Use and Student Outcomes

Social media can assist students with disabilities in fostering connections and preparing them for their future careers when it is used for learning and networking purposes. Based on the study findings, spending an excessive amount of time on social media for fun or distractions is what leads to feelings of isolation. Encouraging students to use social media more moderately can help them reap more benefits instead of negatively impacting their mental health and career goals.

Social Media Use as a Tool for Empowerment

This systematic review explores invisible disabilities in higher education, focusing on students' disclosure decisions and their academic impacts. Students often choose not to disclose their invisible disabilities due to stigma and previous negative experiences, creating a paradox where "what is unseen does not exist." This non-disclosure leads to substantial academic and personal challenges for affected students. The research identifies common barriers these students face and examines factors that promote their academic success. Personal resilience and informal support networks play crucial roles in student outcomes. However, the review emphasizes that systemic institutional change is essential, particularly through inclusive teaching practices such as Universal Design for Learning and mandatory faculty training. These systemic approaches are necessary to transform risks into opportunities and ensure all students can thrive in higher education environments.

When what is unseen does not exist: disclosure, barriers and supports for students with invisible disabilities in higher education

This paper explores three studies that discuss how the timing of group-membership entry—whether a disability is congenital ("born that way") or acquired ("became that way")—influences stigma. This research uniquely compares judgments of people with congenital disability to those with acquired disability, a distinction largely unexamined in previous disability stigma research.

Stigma Towards Congenital Versus Acquired Disability

Using a singular case study design, this study, unravels the complexity and  in-depth the meaning of lived experiences of a single demarcated person from multiple perspectives, revealing the historical life story of a person with intellectual and physical disabilities in the context of the Nazi’s euthanasia practices.

A Case Study of Nazi’s Eugenic Practices

This study explores ​​how young Indian women with visible physical impairments in India’s metropolitan cities construct beauty, experience embodiment, and, most importantly, how they challenge received views on physical attractiveness. 

‘Disabled and beautiful’: young women’s negotiations of beauty and body ideals

This study explores research concerning the identities of professional artists with intellectual disabilities. This research was conducted to further our understanding of the intersections of the arts and identity affirmation within the intellectual disability community. Specific attention is paid to the voices of individuals with intellectual disabilities and the words they used to describe their own experiences.

 The intersections of the arts and identity within the intellectual disability community

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

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. 

Learn Before

Related

Learn After