Disability Visibility

I listened to this book as an audio book. I have been interested in Alice Wong's works for a long time, though you don't hear too much from them personally in the book. For some stories, I wasn't sure why I was listening. Some authors I was familiar with and were going over topics or summaries of their work I'd already read. It didn't help that the narrator made it very hard to tell stories apart and some things were just blending together. As Pretense mentioned in their review: I did not find the different sections meaningful. At other points, the things that I was listening felt very pertinent to where I'm sitting in my life, really struck me. I think different parts of this book can be very meaningful for different people to find healing and feel perceived by someone who shares their experiences. The book has caused me to reflect more deeply in ways I wasn't sure where to start/somewhat avoiding, especially on how I talk about and treat my own disabilities, as well as share that and look for care in my communities.

‘Taking up space as a disabled person is always revolutionary. To have a name is to be given the right to occupy space, but people like me don’t move easily through our society, and more often than not survive along its outermost edges.’ – Sandy Ho

Read for a book club in April. An anthology of essays, this provides much needed space for disability justice and voices to be heard. Many were quite moving, and others less so, but each one provides a particular look into disability. I learned and engaged with the texts a fair bit, though some essays were hard to grasp. Making society more accessible (and more accepting) is not just benefiting those with disabilities, but truly helps empower everyone. It is unimaginable to rate such deeply personal and raw essays. For an anthology though, many of the pieces were not unique to it—the themes and ‘chapters’ did not feel purposeful. The organization could have been a bit clearer. Still, the essays that touched me the most, I definitely would like to hold them in my mind. We can’t have human rights without thinking of all humans—and especially the humanity of those forced to the fringe of society. This book challenges moral attitudes and societal expectations; it isn’t an easy read, but it is incredibly rewarding.

This is one of those where my rating is less about amazing writing and more about learning something. I've read Far From the Tree, which had already helped me reframe disability in my head quite a bit, and this did even more. This is more powerful, of course, because it is a collection of essays by the people with disabilities rather than a book about them.

I don't think any of the essays mentioned this, but I have wondered if my uneducated sense of the value of a life with disability came from a very capitalist mindset. A focus on the "use" of a life as if that is the determining factor. I think that's something to deconstruct.

I would love to live in a world where we prioritized the care of people with disabilities or otherwise. If you need the care, you get it. And it's good care. I hate that that feels like a pipe dream!