1Disability 
Division 
Summer Issue 
August 2020 
Disability 
Division 
Summer Issue 
August 2020 
In This Issue: 

Disability Division 
Mission Statement 

(pages 2-3) 

SSSP 2020 
Annual Meeting 
Description 

(pages 4-6) 

Welcoming New 
Co-Chair, Loren 
Wilbers (page 7) 

Graduate Student 
Paper Competition 
Winner (page 8) 

Member 
Announcements 
and Publications 

(pages 9-14) 

COVID-19 and 
Disability (page 15) 

Intersectionality 
and Disability 

(page 16) 

Greetings from the Disability Division Co-Chairs 

Hello Disability Division Members! 

We hope you are having a pleasant summer. We want to take this opportunity 
to provide you information on Disability Division news and Annual Meeting 
announcements! 

We are pleased to report that Loren Wilbers will be our new 2020-2022 Division 
Co-Chair. For those of you who do not know Loren, you can learn more about her 
on page 7. Kate will continue as Co-Chair through 2021, and Justine will return to 
regular membership. Congratulations and welcome to Loren! 

We are also pleased to announce the results of a very competitive Graduate Student 
Paper Award competition. Congratulations to Nan Lin for the winning paper, 
“Blindness Imagination: Chinese Pre-modern Perspective on Visual Disability” 
(see page 8). We appreciate all of the graduate students who submitted papers 
for the 2020 competition. The diversity and quality of the submissions was a real 
testament to the bright future of our Division. Congratulations, Nan! 

Our Section members created a great line-up of Division-sponsored sessions for 
this year’s conference in San Fransico. As always, these cover diverse topics of 
interest to disability scholars, with many co-sponsored by other SSSP divisions 
of interest. Unfortunately, the sessions were canceled with the majority of the 
meeting due to Covid-19. We hope that the 2021 meeting will bring insightful 
presentations and rich discussion that are a hallmark of our Division Sessions. 

Kate will be leading the charge to begin planning the conference sessions for the 
2021 SSSP Annual meeting. We have held our division’s annual business meeting 
and are delighted by the range of interesting session topic suggestions! On page 17 
you will find a description of the possible directions 2021 will go! 

We look forward to seeing you next year! 

Justine and Kate 


Disability division mission statement 

The Disability Division is devoted to the critical study of disability in society, 
including the structural and sociocultural mechanisms through which 
disability is (re)produced and (re)constructed as an axis of oppression and 
exclusion. Our concerns are wide-ranging, and include the following: 

1. Disability has historically been, and continues to be, overlooked within 
mainstream sociology. Disability remains understudied and undertheorized as both 
a phenomenological category of existence and a social category used to disqualify 
groups of people and deny them access to cultural, economic, and political resources. 
2. The historical treatment of people with disabilities and associations of the 
label disability with disqualification and denial of full citizenship have resulted in 
a persistent pattern of differential outcomes in many areas, including: housing, 
income, education, civic participation, voting, incarceration, and self-determination. 
3. Disability has emerged as a source of collective identity, around which 
people have formed multiple social movement organizations that advocate for 
greater inclusion and social justice for people with disabilities. The disability 
rights movement , the civil rights movement for people with disabilities, has 
engaged in significant and meaningful political activities – including nonviolent 
civil disobedience – as part of this struggle. Counted among their successes are: 
the enactment of the Rehabilitation Act (1973) and subsequent amendments, 
the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (1990), and the inclusion 
of the Community First Choice Option in the Affordable Care Act (2010). 
4. In addition to advocating on behalf of their own community interests, 
people with disabilities have participated in and continue to participate 
in other social movements working in coalition for a more just world. 
5. Ableism, like racism, sexism, ageism, heterosexism, and other 
institutional and structural forms of prejudice, discrimination, and 
marginalization, has a significant and pervasive force impacting the lives 
of everyone in society. Further interrogation is needed into the ideologies 
and practices that sustain ableism, as well as the immediate, intermediate, 
and cumulative effects of ableism on individuals, communities, and nations. 
6. Historical and contemporary (re)presentations of disability and people with 
disabilities by the dominant, able-bodied culture have dehumanized people with 
disabilities and rejected their agency as producers of knowledge. As people with 
disabilities have come to critique and reject these other-made (re)presentations, 
new forms of disability culture(s) have emerged that (re)claim bodily and 
emotional performance and assert people with disabilities as experts on their 
own lives. 

7. As a socio/politico/legal category, disability represents an important claim 
of citizenship on the State for resources, services, protection, and power. 
Conversely, the State is constantly engaged in renegotiating the boundaries 
of the category of disability in order to de-legitimate or mitigate these claims. 
8. Environments influence and inform the experience of disability 
and disabling processes. Social, physical, natural, ideological, and 
geopolitical environments create unique contexts in which specific 
types of bodies and minds are validated and others are marginalized. 
9. The recognition that disability is a social determinant of life opportunities 
and of health across the lifecourse. Disability shapes individuals’ lives, just like 
more widely recognized determinants, such as gender, race, ethnicity, and class. 
10. Members of the division are interested in how disability intersects 
with other social characteristics, including but not limited to, gender, 
race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, veteran and immigration status. 
11. Our examination of disability as a social characteristic is grounded in social 
models of the phenomenon, which address segregation, institutional barriers, 
and discrimination. Although we do not ignore the body in our work, the primary 
focus is on how societies treat individuals with disabilities and the consequences 
of that treatment. 
Our vision of a just world is one where all individuals are supported in their efforts to live to their highest potential in environments that enable opportunity and actively combat all forms of discrimination. Specifically,
these environments would afford access for people with disabilities to meaningfully participate in schools and jobs, families, communities,
and other social groupings. Our work is focused broadly and seriously addresses both the power of disability as a social category and the lives of people with disabilities and the contexts in which they live them. 
Within our division, disability is recognized within the social problems framework. Disability is both something that individuals and groups in society produce (through war and work, for example) and construct (through ideas and representations). Consequently, disability is re-politicized, and the prevailing idea that disability is a personal problem is rejected. 
Examples of some of the topics that our members have explored include:
Disability policies, community activism and organization, the intersection of race and culture in the experience of disability, disability and war,
the medical normalization of disability, and disability and life course. 

Bringing the Hope Back In: Sociological Imagination

and Dreaming Transformation 

The Society for the 
Study of Social Problems 
70th Annual Meeting 
August 7th, 2020 

Virtual Meeting 

“Hope is a decisive element in any attempt 
to bring about social change in the direction 
of greater aliveness, awareness, and reason.” 
Fromm, Erich. 1968. 

The founding meeting of the SSSP was held at Roosevelt College in Chicago in 
September of 1951, with a goal to “rescue sociology from the dehumanizing 
influences of abstract theorizing and fancifully complex research methods” 
(McClung Lee 1988, 12). Turbulence abounded in the post WWII era: in the 
aftermath of the Holocaust, in 1951 Special Operations were being run to rescue 
Jews still in dangerous places; the first transnational television broadcast was 
aired and reached from San Francisco to Boston; Gay bars won protection from 
the Supreme Court; Ella Baker ran for the New York City Council; Jacobo Arbenz 
was elected president of Guatemala (something the U.S. capitalist controlled 
United Fruit Company could not tolerate); and of course, there was McCarthyism. 

Sociologists concerned about changing the world saw the need for an 
organization, a vehicle to mobilize their sociological knowledge and skills. The 
founders wanted to address various forms of injustice, including sexism and 
racism. Looking back to the founding, Dr. Elizabeth Briant Lee wrote in 1991, 
“The Society for the Study of Social Problems (SSSP) was an organization for 
which the time was ripe.” (Lifetimes in Humanist Sociology, Clinical Sociology 
Review accessed at: http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/csr/vol9/iss1/5) 



We are again living in ripe times. While history is not quite repeating, much 
of what’s happening, like a Hollywood movie, is quite predictable. The plot 
is alarmingly similar: Cages, camps, control, callousness, and the breakdown 
of the climate, community and caring. How did we get here? The year 2020 
is a year that begs us to look backwards, assessing the lessons and, through 
a critical lens, thinking about the work we do and the future we are building 
through our work. What can history, the history of our organization, help us 
to understand? How can our history help us to develop dreams for the future 
grounded in scholar activism that will help us to build futures? 

We cannot stop resisting, certainly not now. But resistance alone will not create 
a new world with new possibilities. Resistance will lessen the suffering, for some, 
but without visions for new worlds, transformation is unlikely. Mobilizing our 
sociological imaginations we can think again about the work of SSSP and how 
our collective work has created the SSSP that currently exists. Let’s explore how 
this current moment, ripe – so so ripe, demands that we dream transformation. 
What are the pathways we will build to move toward our dreams? How can 
we build and support solidarity, political engagement, social movements and 
pedagogies of liberation? What can we do to create structural changes that 
bend toward justice? Where does our scholar activism, as we live it through 
SSSP, fit into our dreams of transformation, toward building new worlds? 

In 2020, you are invited to come together to mobilize our sociological 
imaginations toward Dreaming Transformation. Let’s come together in the 
spirit of Dr. Elizabeth Briant Lee and her husband, Al McClung Lee, to explore 
why we are doing sociology in particular ways. The Lees did not stop with the 
founding of SSSP, they continued to dream transformation and build pathways 
throughout their lives. We have that opportunity, to come together and create 
change. 

Please join us in San Francisco in 2020 and together we can call upon our 
sociological imaginations to dream transformation, while building pathways to 
justice and humanity. The hope, the wish for a better world, and the sociological 
imagination are linked in our work. As members of the SSSP, let’s talk about 
possibilities grounded in our dreams and work. 

Heather M. Dalmage, SSSP President 
Roosevelt University 


Virtual Annual Meeting 

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 SSSP Annual Meeting in 
San Francisco has been cancelled. Our primary concern is the health and 
safety of our members. We appreciate the feedback and support that 
we have received from several members and our Board of Directors. 

We sincerely appreciate the hard work and dedication of our Program 
Committee, under the leadership of Co-chairs Tsedale M. Melaku and 
Barbara Katz Rothman; our Division Chairs; our session organizers; and 
the Administrative Office staff. They have worked tirelessly to plan the 
program schedule. Meanwhile, the Board has been meeting regularly via 
Zoom during this difficult period to ensure the safety of our members. 

1/2-Day Virtual Meeting Schedule 

½-day virtual annual meeting on Friday, August 7 from 12:00pm–5:00pm (EDT). The 
schedule of events will include: 

SSSP Business Meeting 12:00pm-1:00pm 
Presidential Address 1:15pm-2:15pm 
Awards Recognition 2:30pm-3:15pm 
Plenary Pandemic Focused Session 3:30pm-5:00pm 

This program is offered as a complimentary benefit to current SSSP members. All 
events will be closed captioned and Zoom will be used as the virtual platform as 
Zoom follows the latest accessibility standards to ensure that their product is fully 
accessible to the latest screen readers. If you have any accessibility concerns or 
questions, please contact IT Specialist Rachel Cogburn at ssspit@utk.edu. 

Please mark your calendar for this important conference. We hope to see you there. 
If you have not renewed your membership or joined SSSP, please consider doing so 
today. 


Welcome to the new division co-chair, Loren Wilbers! 


Loren Wilbers 

University of Wisconsin

- Whitewater 
Dr. Loren is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the Universityof Wisconsin-Whitewater. She teaches Sociology of Disabilityand coordinates the Family, Health & Disability Studies minorand the Disability Studies Certificate programs. 

In 2017 she received the University Chancellor’s Award onDisability Concerns. Her research interests include chronicpain and family experiences with disability. She has publishedin Humanity & Society, Research in Social Science & Disability,
and the Journal of Social Service Research. She has a forthcomingpublication in Narrative Inquiry in Bioethics and is co-authoron the upcoming edition of the “Introducing Disability Studies”
textbook with Ronald J. Berger. 


Congratulations to Nan Lin, GraduateStudent Paper Competition Winner! 

Nan Lin - KU Leuven 

“Blindness Imagination: Chinese Pre-modernPerspective on Visual Disability” 

Abstract: Disability group in China has been under severe social discrimination and neglect 
for a long time, but domestic disability study falls way short in addressing the epistemological 
pitfall. In facing the limited, stagnated medical model of disability studies in contemporary 
China, it is urgent to challenge the social normalcy and to push a new understanding not 
through rigid application of western disability discourse that might seem alien to the Chinese 
cultural environment, but through showcasing interpretations that is culturally close and socially 
compatible. Mediating on different approaches that have been tested and proposed by previous 
studies, I made an attempt in this paper to look back to the pre-modern view of blindness, 
examining its social and cultural fabrication by referring to a wide range of other disciplines such 
as philosophy, medical science, literature and religion, to explore the interrelatedness between 
philosophical, ecological, religious ideology that is crucial in shaping the public image of 
blindness in pre-modern era. I also discussed how the idea of harmony, self and multiple realities 
embedded in pre-modern view of being in the world can be critically applied to problematize 
the binary between the sight and blind and possibly enlighten on the path towards a more 
inclusive and understanding social environment that accommodate all human conditions. The 
culturally and historically distinct case is not only a practice to question the contemporary social 
and cultural construction of the blindness, but also to provide an alternative understanding 
might contribute inspiration and insights to the post-modern disability development. 


Member Announcements and Publications 

Mark Sherry-
University of Toledo 

Division Member Mark Sherry,
alongside Terje Olsen, JanikkeSolstad Vedeler, and John Erik-
sen has co-edited a new book! 

Disability Hate Speech: Social,
Cultural and Political Contexts 

Routledge 

This book, the first to specifically focus on disability hate speech, explains what 
disability hate speech is, why it is important, what laws regulate it (both online and in 
person) and how it is different from other forms of hate. Unfortunately, disability is 
often ignored or overlooked in academic, legal, political, and cultural analyses of the 
broader problem of hate speech. Its unique personal, ideological, economic, political 
and legal dimensions have not been recognized – until now. Disability hate speech 
is an everyday experience for many people, leaving terrible psycho-emotional scars. 
This book includes personal testimonies from victims discussing the personal impact 
of disability hate speech, explaining in detail how such hatred affects them. It also 
presents legal, historical, psychological, and cultural analyses, including the results 
of the first surveys and in-depth interviews ever conducted on this topic in some 
countries. This book makes a vital contribution to understanding disability hatred and 
prejudice, and will be of particular interest to those studying issues associated with 
hate speech, disability, psychology, law, and prejudice. 



Member Announcements and Publications 

Mark Sherry- University of Toledo (continued) 

Part One is entitled “The nature of disability hate speech.” It contains chapters called 
“Disability hate speech laws” by Mark Sherry and Louise Walker, “Disablist hate speech 
online” by Mark Sherry, and “Towards a conceptual and experiential understanding of 
disablist hate speech: Acceptance, harm, and resistance” by Leah Burch. Part Two is 
“The personal impact of disability hate speech” and it contains chapters the following 
chapters: “They think they can call me anything” by Armineh Soorenian, “Very bad 
bedside manner: Medical professionals and hate speech” by Sheri Wells-Jensen and 
Claire Wells-Jensen, “Everyday ableism and hate speech: A tale of three encounters in 
one day” by Damien Milton, and “Hate speech and dwarfism: The influence of cultural 
representations” by Erin Pritchard. Part Three is “Disabilist hate speech within a 
geopolitical context” and contains “Hate speech targeting Sami people with disabilities” 
by Line Melbøe and Hege Gjertsen, “Stereotypes fomenting hate: Perceptions, stigma, 
and real-world consequences for Africans with disabilities” by Mark P. Mostert, 
“Amputation of disability as hate speech pattern in Poland” by Beata Borowska-Beszta, 
“Disability under austerity: Do some forms of political rhetoric constitute disability hate 
speech?” by Lisa Davies, “Hate speech by carers: Exploring an Australian case” by Mark 
Sherry and Solomon Amoatey, “Hammerin’ Hank, (dis)ablism, racism, homophobia, 
and hate speech” by Stephen A. Rosenbaum, and “Hate speech as an expression of 
disablism: An examination of reported hate speech experiences and consequences” by 
Terje Olsen, Janikke Solstad Vedeler, and John Eriksen 

Mark Sherry is Professor of Sociology at The University of Toledo, Terje Olsen is Research 
Director at Fafo Institute for Labour and Social Research in Oslo, Norway, interests 
include welfare state issues, disability studies, youth research, marginalization, labour 
market participation, legal rights and access to justice for persons with disabilities. 
He is Editor-in-chief of the journal Nordic Welfare Research, Janikke Solstad Vedeler 
is a Senior Researcher at Norwegian Social Research at OsloMet – Oslo Metropolitan 
University and at the Nordland Research Institute, and John Eriksen is Emeritus 
Researcher and formerly a Research Director at NOVA – Norwegian Social Research 
Institute, Oslo, Norway. 


Member Announcements and Publications 

Laura Mauldin - University of Connecticut 

Laura has received tenure and been 
promoted to Associate Professor of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality 
Studies, Human Development and 
Family Sciences, with an affiliation in the Department of Sociology 

Congratulations Laura! 

Attribution: Laura Mauldin, 
Portrait by Michael Ian NYC 


“They Told Me My Name: Developing a Deaf Identity” in Symbolic 
Interactions, Authors: Laura Mauldin and Tara Fannon (2020) 

Abstract: 

This article examines the process of deaf people coming to identify as culturally Deaf—a 
distinction typically made in the literature as an identity belonging to those who use sign 
language to communicate—and how this identity process co‐occurs with other social 
identities, namely sexuality and race. Through pairing Goffman’s work with perspectives 
from Feminist Disability Studies, we extend the sociological literature on both identity 
and disability. To do so, we analyze qualitative data collected through narrative interviews 
with five Deaf, gay and lesbian individuals with different racial backgrounds. Our analysis 
surfaces deaf people’s encounters with one another and how, relatedly, becoming Deaf 
is shaped by Goffman’s concepts of affiliation and obtrusiveness. For example, we show 
how shifting affiliations occur when transitioning into a minority (e.g., Deaf) culture, 
through interactions that demand managing the obtrusiveness of multiple intersecting, 
potentially discrediting, statuses. Our article also reveals a bidirectional relationship 
between affiliation and obtrusiveness. 



Member Announcements and Publications 

Laura Mauldin - University of Connecticut (continued) 

It’s Not That Way You know, She Has a Good Future”: Women’s Experiences of 
Disability and Community-based Rehabilitation in Sri Lanka, book Chapter in 
Research in Social Science and Disability, Volume 11, Authors: Carmen Britton and 
Laura Mauldin (2019) 

Abstract: 

The results support calls to prioritize disabled voices in disability research in the Global 
South, which is currently dominated by a CBR approach in the name of “development.” 
These data also show the need to systematically address power relations currently at 
work in policies, practices, and communities that perpetuate disablement; document 
the need for communities and research to be more inclusive; and obligate scholars and 
practitioners to be more aware of how the CBR context may aim for development and 
change, yet often maintain highly gendered economic, political, and social processes of 
isolation. This project illustrates the ways in which careful attention to personal stories 
can illuminate complex socio-cultural processes. The chapter also brings voices of women 
in the Global South into the discourses on narratives and disability, both of which are 
dominated by perspectives from the industrialized west 

Justine Egner - 
University of Wisconsin La Crosse 

“We love each other into meaning”: Queer Disabled 
Tumblr Users Constructing Identity Narratives 
Through Love and Anger, book Chapter in Research 

in Social Science and Disability, Volume 11 (2019) 

Abstract: This chapter extends the scholarly conversation 
on both narratives and disability by suggesting ways in 
which counternarratives about individuals with complex intersectional identities can be 
constructed in virtual communities. In so doing, the chapter brings poorly represented 
perspectives into discourses on disability and narratives. The study also contributes 
to the literature on the importance of emotion, specifically by highlighting the 
deployment of love and anger to counteract experiences of shame and marginalization. 

Attribution: Justine Egner, 
Portrait by Jesse Egner 



Member Announcements and Publications 

University of Minnesota Press 


Liat Ben-Moshe - 
University of Illinois - Chicago 

Decarcerating Disability:
Deinstitutionalization and 
Prison Abolition 

Abstract: 

Prison abolition and decarceration are increasingly debated, but it is often without taking 
into account the largest exodus of people from carceral facilities in the twentieth century: 
the closure of disability institutions and psychiatric hospitals. Decarcerating Disability 
provides a much-needed corrective, combining a genealogy of deinstitutionalization with 
critiques of the current prison system. 

Liat Ben-Moshe provides groundbreaking case studies that show how abolition is not 
an unattainable goal but rather a reality, and how it plays out in different arenas of 
incarceration—antipsychiatry, the field of intellectual disabilities, and the fight against 
the prison-industrial complex. Ben-Moshe discusses a range of topics, including why 
deinstitutionalization is often wrongly blamed for the rise in incarceration; who resists 
decarceration and deinstitutionalization, and the coalitions opposing such resistance; and 
how understanding deinstitutionalization as a form of residential integration makes visible 
intersections with racial desegregation. By connecting deinstitutionalization with prison 
abolition, Decarcerating Disability also illuminates some of the limitations of disability 
rights and inclusion discourses, as well as tactics such as litigation, in securing freedom. 
Decarcerating Disability’s rich analysis of lived experience, history, and culture helps to 
chart a way out of a failing system of incarceration. 



Publication Feature 

Penguin Random House 


As part of the 2020 meetings in San Fransico, 
the Disability Division put together many 
exciting panels -- two of which focused 
on promoting the work of disability 
justice activists. We had a strong lineup 
of scholars and activists doing disability 
justice work that accepted our invitation 
to present and we are disappointed that in-
person engagement will have to wait. Alice 
Wong was slated to present and we would 
like to feature Alice’s new publication. 

Alice Wong -
Disability Visibility Project 

Disability Visibility: First-Person StoriesFrom the Twenty-First Century 

Abstract: 

One in five people in the United States lives with a disability. Some disabilities are visible, 
others less apparent—but all are underrepresented in media and popular culture. Now, 
just in time for the thirtieth anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, activist 
Alice Wong brings together this urgent, galvanizing collection of contemporary essays by 
disabled people. 

From Harriet McBryde Johnson’s account of her debate with Peter Singer over her own 
personhood to original pieces by authors like Keah Brown and Haben Girma; from blog 
posts, manifestos, and eulogies to Congressional testimonies, and beyond: this anthology 
gives a glimpse into the rich complexity of the disabled experience, highlighting the 
passions, talents, and everyday lives of this community. It invites readers to question their 
own understandings. It celebrates and documents disability culture in the now. It looks to 
the future and the past with hope and love. 



Disability and Covid-19 

When we began to draft this newsletter in late February we couldn’t imagine how many 
drafts it would have to go through to remain applicable in our quickly changing world; 
we certainly did not expect to include a section on pandemic resources. While we are 
disappointed by the cancellation of our in-person meeting and saddened by the stress, 
pain, and needles loss the pandemic has brought into our lives we are optimistic that it 
may allow for the opportunity to spotlight the work of disability scholars and activists. We 
imagine many of our members are having ever-increasing conversations about accessibility 
at our institutions and engaging in dialogues and disability justice work that focuses on the 
impact of the pandemic in the lives of disabled people. Below, you will find a few disability 
and Covid-19 resources that may be useful to our members. 

Thank you to member Brian Grossman for compiling and submitting these resources! 

Virtual Panel - titled “Ensuring Health Equity for Persons with Disabilities” on the context 
of ethics and health rationing protocols during Covid-19: 

https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/event/2020-ensuring-health-equity-personswith-
disabilities-virtual 


Blog Post - Harvard Law Review blog post titled “Disability and Health in the Age of 
Triage”, Authors: Rabia Belt, Celina Malave, and Camila Strassle: 

https://blog.harvardlawreview.org/disability-and-health-in-the-age-of-triage/ 


Magazine Article - The Progressive article titled “Shut Down the Death Traps: COVID-19 
is setting people with disabilities back - More than they already were”, Author: Mike 
Ervin: 

https://progressive.org/magazine/shut-down-the-death-traps-ervin-200604/?fb 
clid=IwAR1n1EryrUKOIx9l7hLxfi9no6VjhqCK-2VYlFQhT2vvkmGTpAdmbnYI0vI#. 
Xt8GV8_2Gus.facebook 


Statement from the Center for Public Representation, The Arc, and Communication First: 

https://www.centerforpublicrep.org/wp-content/uploads/FINAL-DisabilityGroup-
Press-Release-on-CT-OCR-Resolution-060920.pdf 


Post from Sins Invalid - Post titled Social Distancing and Crip Survival: A Disability 
Centered Response to Covid-19: 

https://www.sinsinvalid.org/news-1/2020/3/19/social-distancing-and-cripsurvival-
a-disability-centered-response-to-covid-19 




Thinking and Teaching about Disability and 
Intersectionaility 

Thank you to member Brian Grossman for 
compiling and submitting these resources! 

Ableism in Politics - The Washington Post article titled “Calling Trump unwell doesn’t 
hurt Trump. It hurts disabled people”, Author: Rebecca Cokley: 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/06/16/mock-
trump-hurts-disabled/?fbclid=IwAR2hQFgnXI0NdBdtgZSYmIlU 
7LjuqrhIC0QIJltD6YBaadp6TMb0a78rjEw 


Coming out, Disability, and Sexuality - Autostraddle post titled “People Who Helped Me 
Come to My (Bi)sexual Awakening”, Author: Keah Brown: 

https://www.autostraddle.com/people-who-helped-me-cometo-
my-bisexual-awakening-a-short-thank-you-list/ 


Disability Justice and Abolition- Article from the National Lawyers Guild titled “Disability 
Justice and Abolition”, Author: Katie Tastrom: 

https://www.nlg.org/disability-justice-and-abolition/ 


Covid-19, Institutions, and Disability Rights - Post on Disability Visability Project titled 
“Freedom for Some is Not Freedom for All”, Author: Alice Wong: 

https://disabilityvisibilityproject.com/2020/06/07/ 
fre 
edom-for 
-some-is-not 
-freedom-for-all/ 




We have begun planning the sessions for the 2021 SSSP Annual 
meeting in Chicago. We have utilized our business meeting 
and email suggestions to plan sessions for the following year’s 
conference. We will have 2-3 thematic division sessions, 6-7 
Co-sponsored sessions, and one virtual session. Kate, Loren, 
and the organizers are currently working out the details. 
Themes we will explore in next year’s meeting include: Disability 
Revolution, Disability Justice, Beyond ADA 30, Impact of COVID-19, 
Disability and Intimate Citizenship, and Disability and Family Care. 
2021 Society for the Study of Social Problems 
Theme: Revolutionary Sociology: Truth, 
Healing, Reparations and Restructuring 

Don’t Forget to Find Us on Facebook and Twitter! 


https://www.facebook.com/SSSPDisability/ 

@SSSPDisability