About Us: Essays from the Disability Series of the New York Times

by Peter Catapano (Editor), Rosemarie Garland-Thomson (Editor)

Overview

Based on the historic New York Times series, About Us features intimate, firsthand accounts on what it means, and how it feels, to live with a disability.

Boldly claiming a space where people with disabilities tell the stories of their own lives—not other’s stories about them—About Us captures the voices of a community that has for too long been stereotyped and misrepresented. Speaking not only to people with disabilities and their support networks, but to all of us, the authors in About Us offer intimate stories of how they navigate a world not built for them. Echoing the refrain of the disability rights movement, “nothing about us without us,” this collection, with a foreword by Andrew Solomon, is a landmark publication of the disability movement for readers of all backgrounds, communities, and abilities.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781631498589
Publisher:	Liveright Publishing Corporation
Publication date:	02/23/2021
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	517,699
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Peter Catapano is an award-winning opinion editor at the New York Times and the coeditor of several books, including About Us: Essays from the Disability Series of the New York Times.

Rosemarie Garland-Thomson is a professor of English and bioethics at Emory University.

Table of Contents

Foreword Andrew Solomon ix

Preface Peter Catapano ix

Introduction Rosemarie Garland-Thomson xxiii

I Justice

Becoming Disabled Rosemarie Garland-Thomson 3

The Nazis' First Victims Were the Disabled Kenny Fries 9

Mental Illness Is Not a Horror Show Andrew Solomon 15

Disability and the Right to Choose Jennifer Bartlett 18

If You're in a Wheelchair, Segregation Lives Luticha Doucette 22

My Medicaid, My Life Alice Wong 27

You Are Special! Now Stop Being Different Jonathan Mooney 31

Brain Injury and the Civil Right We Don't Think About Joseph J. Fins 35

II Belonging

I Don't Want To Be "Inspiring" John Altmann 43

The Deaf Body in Public Space Rachel Kolb 46

My "Orphan Disease" Has Given Me a New Family Rosemarie Garland-Thomson 50

My Life With Tourette Syndrome Shane Fistell 55

The Everyday Anxiety of the Stutterer Joseph P. Carter 60

How to Really See a Blind Person Brad Snyder 64

The Importance of Facial Equality Ariel Henley 68

Finding Refuge With the Skin I'm In Anne Kaier 72

What It Means to Heal Cyndi Jones 76

III Working

I Use a Wheelchair. And Yes, I'm Your Doctor. Cheri A. Blauwet 81

Standing Up for What I Need Carol R. Stejnberg 86

Where All Bodies Are Exquisite Riva Lehrer 90

I Lost My Voice, But Help Others Find Theirs Alex Hubbard 94

The "Madman" Is Back in the Building Zack McDermott 98

Hildegard's Visions, and Mine Jenny Giering 104

Finding Myself on the Page Ona Gritz 108

Should I Tell My Students I Have Depression? Abby L. Wilkerson 113

We Are the Original Lifehackers Liz Jackson 118

IV Navigating

My Supercharged, Tricked Out, Bluetooth Wheelchair Life Force Katie Savin 125

New York Has a Great Subway, If You're Not in a Wheelchair Sasha Blair-Goldensohn 129

A Symbol for "Nobody" That's Really for Everybody Elizabeth Guffey 133

Feeling My Way Into Blindness Edward Hoagland 136

The Athlete in Me Won't Stop Todd Balf 141

The Dawn of the "Tryborg" Jillian Weise 145

Flying While Blind Georgina Kleege 149

V Coping

My Life With Paralysis, It's a Workout Valerie Piro 155

My $1,000 Anxiety Attack Joanna Novak 159

When Life Gave Me Lemons, I Had a Panic Attack Gila Lyons 165

Am I Too Embarrassed to Save My Life? Jane Eaton Hamilton 168

My Paralympic Blues Emily Rapp Black 172

The Hawk Can Soar Randi Davenport 176

VI Love

A Girlfriend of My Own Daniel Simpson 183

Love, Eventually Ona Gritz 186

How to Play the Online Dating Game, in a Wheelchair Emily Ladau 191

Explaining Our Bodies, Finding Ourselves Molly McCully Brown Susannah Nevison 195

Longing for the Male Gaze Jennifer Bartlett 203

Intimacy Without Touch Elizabeth Jameson Catherine Monahon 207

The Three-Legged Dog Who Carried Me Laurie Clements Lambeth 212

VII Family

Passing My Disability On to My Children Sheila Black 219

I Have Diabetes. Am I to Blame? Rivers Solomon 224

10 Things My Chronic Illness Taught My Children Paula M. Fitzgibbons 228

The Importance of Finding Family Alaina Leary 233

Trying to Embrace a "Cure" Sheila Black 237

In My Mother's Eyes, and Mine Catherine Kudlick 241

A Portrait of Intimate Violence Anne Finger 245

VIII Joy

Mishearings Oliver Sacks 251

Space Travel: A Vision Daniel Simpson 255

Learning to Sing Again Anne Kaier 259

Sensations of Sound: On Deafness and Music Rachel Kolb 263

I Dance Because I Can Alice Sheppard 266

Stories About Disability Don't Have to Be Sad Melissa Shang 271

In My Chronic Illness, I Found a Deeper Meaning Elliot Kukla 274

A Disabled Life Is a Life Worth Living Ben Mattlin 278

About the Contributors 283

Editorial Reviews

09/01/2020

"Nothing About Us Without Us" is the cri de coeur of the disability civil rights movement, and this anthology is definitely "about us." Drawn on the groundbreaking New York Times series, it offers firsthand, heart-close accounts of what it's like to live with a disability.

Library Journal

06/10/2019

In this exquisite collection drawn from the Times essays series started in 2016, disability is, refreshingly, seen as a part of daily life, even as the contributors discuss facing a “world that does not expect us and is often not made for us.” Ona Gritz, who has right hemiplegia, a form of cerebral palsy, recalls asking a literary agent who suggested she write a memoir, “Would I have to be disabled on every page?” Coeditor Garland-Thomson, having learning her asymmetrical hands and forearms are caused by complex syndactyly, an exceptionally rare genetic condition, no longer feels like an “orphan” but part of a “world of disability pride and advocacy.” Similarly, the late Oliver Sacks finds value in his disability, an increasing loss of hearing, enjoying how “in the realm of mishearing... a biography of cancer can become a biography of Cantor (one of my favorite mathematicians)... and mere mention of Christmas Eve a command to ‘Kiss my feet!’ ” The 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act comes up often throughout, making fully clear the turning point it represented. Demonstrating, above all, the value of persistence, Catapano and Garland-Thomson’s anthology merits a spot on everyone’s reading list for its brilliant assemblage of voices and stories. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

2019-06-09
Disabled essayists reflect on love, joy, justice, community, and navigating daily challenges.

For three years, the New York Times has hosted "Disability," a weekly series of essays by and about people with disabilities. The newspaper's opinion editor Catapano (co-editor: Modern Ethics in 77 Arguments: A Stone Reader, 2016, etc.) and disabilities scholar Garland-Thomson (English and Bioethics/Emory Univ.; Extraordinary Bodies: Figuring Physical Disability in American Culture and Literature, 1997, etc.) have selected some 60 pieces from the series, amply fulfilling their aim of representing the diversity and richness of human experience. Although the contributors all have access to language, therefore representing only a partial demographic of the disabled, they discuss common issues, such as the desire for independence balanced with the need for intimacy and caring. As psychologist Andrew Solomon (who was diagnosed with depression) writes in the introduction, the book "is really in many ways about how we seek meaning in who we are rather than in who we might have wished to be." The essayists convey with uncommon candor how they live with disabilities that include blindness, deafness, panic attacks, anxiety, depression, cerebral palsy, stuttering, paralysis, and Tourette's. As Garland-Thomson notes, disability can affect anyone, suddenly and randomly: "An oncoming car in the wrong direction can transform the person we think we are today to a different one tomorrow. No other social identity category is so porous and unstable." Several writers found themselves disabled after an accident or injury; others were born with anomalies. Garland-Thomson, for example, has a rare genetic condition that resulted in her having disproportionate arm lengths and only six fingers. Living in a world built for "the fully fingered," she proved to be resourceful in "developing practical workarounds for the life demands my body did not meet." Many writers praise the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, which helped individuals meet their needs by requiring such adaptions as ramps, Braille materials, hearing assistance equipment, elevators, special parking places, and pedestrian curb cuts. Although several writers resist being called inspiring, their eloquent essays are nothing less.

A rich, moving collection.

Kirkus Reviews