Disability Visibility by Alice Wong

Book Review

Did you know that people with disabilities are the largest “minority” group in the United States? Comprising 20% of the US population, one in five Americans lives with a disability.

In this deeply nuanced collection of short stories, we see a vast array of first-person accounts documenting the day-to-day lives of individuals living with disabilities. While I wouldn’t call this a fun read, it’s incredibly educational and I highly recommend it to those who seek to learn more about the spectrum of disability, disability rights and intersectional feminism.

This unique collection of stories - which includes testimonies, blog posts and even eulogies - shines a light on how disabled individuals, many of whom are BIPOC and/or LGBTQIA+, exist in a world built for homogeneity.

In the opening story, Harriet McBryde Johnson recounts her experience debating the infamous Peter Singer (a Princeton professor who supports the euthanasia of severely disabled infants) over her right to exist. Johnson, who passed away in 2008, was a highly acclaimed civil rights attorney and activist who suffered from a neuromuscular disease that made her reliant on her electric wheelchair. While her story focuses on a major debate of morality and ethics, I found the small details included in her experience equally eye-opening - for example, how and what she ate given her physical limitations as well as common travel mishaps she encountered as a disabled woman (like a damaged wheelchair and an inaccessible hotel room).

Despite the often heavy subject matter, this book is filled with stories of perseverance and hope in the face of prejudice and subjugation.

I had just finished reading this book when the news broke about Britney Spears’ testimony in her conservatorship trial. While Britney’s story is heartbreaking, it is certainly not new - at least not to the disabled community. The book briefly touches on conservatorship in a few of the stories and it’s something I encourage everyone to further educate themselves on - especially as it concerns the disabled community.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

TW: ableism, chronic illness, suicidal ideation, mental illness, sexual assault, transphobia, racism and more