Fitchburg - Disability Pride Month

Twelve-and-a-half year old Emelyn Ethrige lives with her father in South Carolina, dreams of wheelchair motocross, and makes custom chair bags trying to earn enough money to buy a serious set of wheels. She has been in a wheelchair all her life and is just fine getting around without help, but it seems that since her mother was killed in an accident everyone (father, grandparents, teachers, and classmates) have started treating her differently: urging...

In the summer of 2019, journalist Melissa Blake penned an op-ed for CNN Opinion. A conservative pundit caught wind of it, mentioning Blake's work in a YouTube video. What happened next is equal parts a searing view into society, how we collectively view and treat disabled people, and the making of an advocate. After a troll said that Blake should be banned from posting pictures of herself, she took to Twitter and defiantly posted three smiling selfies,...

"In Black Disability Politics Sami Schalk explores how issues of disability, broadly construed, have been and continue to be incorporated into Black activism, from the 1970s to the present. In so doing, she establishes a new lineage for disability politics, one that allows the work of contemporary Black disability justice activists to be central. Aiming to speak to both academic and activist audiences, Black Disability Politics identifies common qualities...

An award-winning, comprehensive resource for people living with disabilities and those committed to empowering them, offering resources for success at work, in school, and in the community.

"A guide for how to be a thoughtful, informed ally to disabled people, with actionable steps for what to say and do (and what not to do) and how you can help make the world a more accessible place"--

Covers the entirety of U.S. disability history, from pre-1492 to the present. Disability is not just the story of someone we love or the story of whom we may become; rather it is undoubtedly the story of our nation. It places the experiences of people with disabilities at the center of the American narrative. In many ways, it's a familiar telling. In other ways, however, it is a radical repositioning of U.S. history. By doing so, the book casts new...

"This series explores disability in a comprehensive, honest, and age-appropriate way. This book explores disability pride, self-advocacy, and person-first language. Engaging inquiry-based sidebars encourage students to LOOK, THINK, MAKE A GUESS, ASK QUESTIONS, and CREATE. Books are authored by writers with disabilities and the series has been developed in partnership with Easterseals who is leading the way to full equity, inclusion, and access through...

"A groundbreaking collection of first-person writing on the joys and challenges of the modern disability experience: Disability Visibility brings together the voices of activists, authors, lawyers, politicians, artists, and everyday people whose daily lives are, in the words of playwright Neil Marcus, "an art . . . an ingenious way to live." According to the last census, one in five people in the United States lives with a disability. Some are visible,...

"Lilah is stuck in the middle. At least, that's what having a hearing loss seems like sometimes -- when you don't feel "deaf enough" to identify as Deaf or hearing enough to meet the world's expectations. But this summer, Lilah is ready for a change. When Lilah becomes a counselor at a summer camp for the deaf and blind, her plan is to brush up on her ASL. Once there, she also finds a community. There are cute British lifeguards who break hearts but...

In this creative non-fiction story, Sonia and her friends plant a garden, and each one contributes in his or her own special way, in a book that celebrates the many differences among humans. In this warm and inclusive story by U.S. Supreme Justice Sonia Sotomayor, inspired by her own childhood diagnosis of diabetes, readers join along as differently abled kids use their strengths to work together and learn about each other.