I like to think things are getting better than they were in my day as a graduate student in writing at the University of Iowa when being a disabled student was humiliating, to say the least. I won’t delve into my miseries butI do believe, cautiously that improvement is on the way.
For one thing there are first rate writers identifying as disabled who are now teaching. And for another thing there’s an emergent awareness that disability is a meaningful part of thinking about creativity.
I want to point readers to a thoughtful and timely book:”Divergent Writers: Disability, Illness, Neurodivergence, and Ableism in Creative Writing” Edited by Christie Collins and Saul Lemerond.
I have been relishing both the book and its hopeful declarations.
At Iowa I was told that if I took longer to read texts I shouldn’t be in graduate school. When I complained I received a collective stink-eye. One administrator called me a “whiner” which was both cruel and untrue.
I would like very much to publish some quotes from this terrific collection but for reasons known only to software engineers I can’t cut and paste from the book. But I will. Congratulations to Christie Collins and Saul Lemerod. In the meantime here’s a YouTube Interview with Christie from the Mississippi State University Arts and Sciences folks:
https://youtu.be/Y_AiVPAiDuE?si=etX7JcGHMD3mIgVr
