“Snyder and Mitchell offer a provocative, reasonable, and well-written history and analysis of the ‘cultural dis-locations’ of disability since the industrial period and the appearance of eugenics. Here they bring together historical, cultural, and literary methods of analysis in order to advance a deeper understanding of the complex attitudes surrounding disability and people with disabilities. There is indeed no other book like it. It should become a staple in the libraries of every disability scholar.”--Brenda Jo Brueggemann, The Ohio State University

 

Brenda Jo Brueggemann

“In The Cultural Locations of Disability, Sharon Snyder and David Mitchell have provided us a fine book on how to understand how dominant culture works. Though the book interrogates how culture specifically works on disability, what is especially valuable is how the book illuminates all sorts of dark secrets and disabling myths that ultimately helps us see better and understand more about disability oppression and where the struggle against it must be fought. I highly recommend the book.”

James I. Charlton, author of Nothing About Us Without Us

“I learned something new and unanticipated from almost every page of this book. Snyder and Mitchell’s Cultural Locations of Disability lays out in an extraordinary fashion the historical cultural locations of disabled citizens: charity systems, institutions for the feebleminded, the disability research industry, medical and popular film representations of disability, and current academic trends. The authors’ strategy is to interpret these cultural locations as forms of oppression, not characterized by exclusion but by a pervasive inclusion that nevertheless does violence to disabled people. This is a book that should be read and reread, and I am confident that people will be reading it for years to come.”

Tobin Siebers, University of Michigan

"I am glad I read this book. It ranges widely, and makes some sweeping generalizations. Athough it is hard to agree with it in every detail, as a contribution to understanding of disability, past and present, it is a book not to be missed."

Jan Walmsley | Medical History