Our Collective's Approach to CDS

We view Critical Disability Studies (CDS) as a multidisciplinary academic-activist area of study that values disability* and diversity and centres the perspectives of disabled people. We embrace critical points of view that question the way we think about human differences, the language we use about ourselves and others, and what makes up a good life.

 

CDS opposes a singular, “normal” way of being that is dominant in health, medicine, rehabilitation, social and community services, education, law, and public policy, which devalues and discriminates against people who do not meet “normal” standards. CDS is not about studying ways to cure or fix disability. Rather, CDS examines how disability has come to be understood in societies and reveals the inequities disabled people experience.

 

CDS informs and is informed by other broad social justice movements. For example, we value the disability justice framework developed by queer/racialized disability scholars and activists (Sins Invalid).

 

*We recognize that the language of disability and identity is constantly shifting and under debate. We embrace the multiple ways of naming and identifying of self and communities with disability and difference.