Rembis; Yes We Can Change 19 Yes We Can Change: Disability Studies - Enabling Equality Michael A. Rembis, Ph.D. University at Buffalo Abstract In this article, I offer a brief assessment of the international disability rights and culture movements and disability studies, as well as a commentary on the future of disability and disability studies. A diverse group of activists, artists, and scholars have brought about momentous legal changes in dozens of countries around the world. They have also enabled a critical rearticulation of what it means to be disabled. Yet, this revisioning of disability and this repositioning of disabled people remains fraught. I contend that while movement participants, scholars, and their allies are off to a great start, they have yet to grapple in any serious way with some of the most important and contentious issues within the disability rights and culture movements and disability studies, namely their own internal diversity and the material reality of many disabled peoples’ lives. Despite these complexities, I maintain that the disability rights and culture movements and disability studies have tremendous transformative potential. We are living at a critical moment of history. The monolith), we recognized that we, the disabled, had ar- election of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the rived socially and politically. Or had we? United States on November 4, 2008 was greeted the In this article, I will offer a brief assessment of the world over with a potent mixture of unrestrained joy recent past and a commentary on the future of disability and hope by those individuals, groups, and organiza- and disability studies. I will highlight the major legal tions who rallied around his campaign slogan, “Yes we and theoretical contributions that a diverse group of can change” (Obama, 2008b). Especially moved were activists, artists, and scholars have made in opening people of color, people with disabilities, and women; the world to people with disabilities, and I will show people who have historically been excluded both struc- that despite momentous achievements in many areas, turally and culturally from power. much work remains to be done. By forcing legislators, When President-elect Obama delivered his victory administrators and academics, architects and building speech to the more than one million people crammed into contractors, city planners and business owners, to allow Chicago’s Grant Park and millions more watching around equal access, the disability rights and culture movements the world, he directly acknowledged his constituency, the and disability studies have made people with a broad “young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, range of disabilities an increasingly salient minority. black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, Activists, artists, and academics have also enabled a straight, disabled and not disabled,” who welcomed new critical rearticulation of what it means to be disabled. possibilities, supported democracy, and believed that their We are seeing in K-12 and post-secondary edu- voices could make a difference in the future of the United cation, in the media, and in our everyday lives, the States and the world (Obama, 2008a). tremendous potential that this new access and this new For those of us active in the disability rights and understanding of disability hold. Yet, this re-articulation culture movements and disability studies, Obama’s of disability and this repositioning of disabled people victory speech was truly an historic event. Though the remain contentious and incomplete. While we are off most politicized among us balked at Obama’s choice of to a great start, those of us closest to the movement and words (the “disabled”—as if we were some immutable to disability studies have fallen short in our attempts to 20 Journal of Postsecondary Education and Disability, Vol. 23, No. 1; 2010 contend with some of the most important issues within Prodded by movement participants and its member the disability rights and culture movements and disabil- states, the United Nations (UN), in many ways, became ity studies, namely our own diversity and the material a global standard bearer for disability rights. Though reality of many of our lives. it remained focused largely on the rehabilitation and reintegration of so-called productive disabled people, Activists, Artists, and Scholars especially those living in the “developing world,” by the early 1970s the UN began to advocate for the rights of In this fi rst section, I will provide a brief historical people with disabilities. According to the UN’s own his- account of the rise of the international disability rights tory, it began during the 1960s to recognize an increas- and culture movements and disability studies. All three ing awareness of the importance of new rehabilitation movements emerged roughly at the same time and were strategies (United Nations, 2003-04a). On December very much interrelated. They, moreover, are the reason 20, 1971, the UN General Assembly introduced the why President-elect Obama included disabled people in Declaration on the Rights of Mentally Retarded Persons his victory speech. and called for national and international action to ensure Disabled people and their allies have been active that it became “the accepted basis and frame of refer- socially and politically for well over one hundred years. ence for protecting the rights of the disabled” (United Recent scholarship (Burch, 2001; Kudlick, 2001; Long- Nations, 2003-04b). In 1973, the UN recognized the more, 2003) has shown that in the United States for suggestion that it increase recruitment of disabled people example, both blind people and deaf people have been in its own organization, and in 1975, at its 24th session, actively building and defending their own cultures and the Commission for Social Development recommended communities since at least the turn of the twentieth cen- the elimination of physical and architectural barriers that tury. Longmore (2003, p. 105), moreover, has argued that were preventing “the full social integration of disabled by the mid-twentieth century, the National Federation of persons.” In December of the same year, the UN Gen- the Blind (NFB) had a “vigorous” lobby in Washington eral Assembly adopted its Declaration on the Rights of that took a “consistent” civil rights approach to disability Disabled Persons, which stated that “all persons with issues. Parents and other allies of cognitively disabled disabilities are entitled to the rights stipulated, without and learning disabled individuals have also been active in respect to race, colour, sex, language, religion, politi- gaining and protecting their civil rights and their access cal or other opinions, national or social origin, state of to education, employment, and community living for wealth, birth or any other situation.” The following year, decades (Noll & Trent, 2004). Yet, scholars agree that the General Assembly suggested that member states take the modern disability rights movement, which in most into account the recommendations highlighted in the countries consists of a broad cross-section of the disabled Declaration, and designated 1981, the International Year population and highlights a politicized disabled identity, for Disabled Persons (United Nations, 2003-04b). emerged out of the social turmoil and civil rights struggles The period from the late 1970s to the early 1990s of the 1960s and 1970s. proved to be an important transitional time for the Initially based primarily in the United States and disability rights movement, both locally and globally. the United Kingdom, the modern disability rights move- Local groups such as ADAPT (American Disabled for ment focused largely on access, accommodation, and Accessible Public Transit) raised the stakes by put- independent living (Barton & Oliver, 1997; Campbell ting their bodies on the line for disability rights—by & Oliver, 1996; Charlton, 2000; Fleischer & Zames, positioning themselves in front of inaccessible buses 2000; Hahn, 2002; Oliver, 1996: Shapiro, 1994; Switzer, (Charlton, 2000; Fleischer & Zames, 2000; Hahn, 2002; 2003). Throughout the 1970s, numerous disability rights Johnson & Shaw, 2001; Shapiro, 1994; Switzer, 2003). groups emerged in other parts of Europe, and in New Other activist groups, such as the American Coalition Zealand, Australia, Latin America, and southern Africa of Citizens with Disabilities, led sit-ins at the offi ces as well. Although they never lost sight of their original of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare goals, by the early 1980s, disability rights organiza- (HEW) in New York, Washington D.C., Denver, and tions in various parts of the world became increasingly San Francisco to demand implementation of section involved in broader global human rights struggles and 504 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act. Protestors in San national liberation movements (Charlton, 2000). Francisco remained in HEW offi ces for 25 days in 1977, Rembis; Yes We Can Change 21 making it the longest occupation of a federal building by what they referred to as a medical model of disability and political protestors in U.S. history (Longmore, 2003). began fashioning a socio-political model of disability. At the global level, the UN adopted an increasingly Put simply, the socio-political model of disability makes progressive position on disability. Following the First a critical distinction between impairment and disability Founding Congress of Disabled Peoples International,