Excerpt from Inclusion Daily
New Study Reveals Lack Of Characters With Disabilities On Television
(Tri-Union Performers with Disabilities Committee)
September 30, 2010
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA– [Excerpt] October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month and a new report released today on minority representation on broadcast television shows that scripted characters with disabilities will represent only one percent of all scripted series regular characters — six characters out of 587 — on the five broadcast networks: ABC, CBS, The CW, Fox, and NBC. Not only is this invisibility in the media misrepresentative of people with disabilities, it also means few opportunities for actors with disabilities to be cast.
While people with disabilities are largely absent from the television scene, they are very present in the American Scene. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2008 American Community Survey, the percentage of U.S. citizens reporting an apparent disability is slightly more than 12% (or 36.2 million people). The inclusion of people with non-apparent, ADA-covered disabilities, such as cancer or HIV, greatly increase this census number. Yet, even the original figure is nowhere nearly reflected by the broadcast networks.
As of this count, three of the six series regular characters with disabilities scheduled to appear in the upcoming season are on the Fox network: the title character on House, who uses a cane, Dr. Remy “Thirteen” Hadley on House who has Huntington’s Disease, and Artie Abrams on Glee, who uses a wheelchair. On three other networks, Saul on Brothers & Sisters (ABC) is living with HIV, young Max Braverman on Parenthood (NBC) has Asperger syndrome, and Dr. Albert Robbins on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (CBS) has a prosthetic leg.
Entire article:
New Study Reveals Lack of Characters With Disabilities on Television
http://www.InclusionDaily.com/news/2010/red/0930e.htm
Related:
Tri-Union Performers with Disabilities Committee
http://www.iampwd.org/home
Planet of the Blind 