Page 26 - Mainstreamer e-Magazine 01 June 2022 - Final (4)

Disability Visibility: First Person Stories

from the Twenty-First Century

Reviewed by Dr. Makmor Tumin

and Connecting. For this review, only five articles
were discussed, which focus on only those having
eyesight issues.

Part one contains an article by June Eric-Udorie
entitled “When You are Waiting to be Healed”. She
shares her inner refusal to admit her disability.
Born with nystagmus, she spent a lot of time
thinking and praying that one day her problem can
be cured, as soon as possible. It is very difficult
for a person to accept his or her disability if they
Title: Disability Visibility: First Person Stories from Disability Visibility: First Person Stories from are not disabled enough. Unwelcoming responses
from friends and society on her disability made her
tthe Twenty-First Centuryhe Twenty-First Century
Year: 2020 unhappy and enraged, but after she had admitted
Author: Wong, A. (Ed.) wholeheartedly that her nystagmus is permanent

Genre: Non-fiction and she was regarded as disabled/partially blind.
She then transformed herself as a person with her
Publisher: Vintage Books own rights of disability.

The second article under Part 2 (Becoming)
is entitled “Guide Dogs Don’t Lead Blind People.
t is not uncommon for people to hide their It contains an article entitled “We Wander as
weaknesses, illnesses, and disabilities, One,” written by Haben Girma. She shares her
Iespecially when they are not obvious. Many experience in building up confidence, relying on
people have been recently included in a People a guide dog, and of course the white cane. She
with Disabilities (PwDs) WhatsApp Group with tells readers that it is misleading to think that
PwDs of different categories. I have noticed that with a guide dog, the blind can be guided. Equally
not all disabled people are happy being grouped important, even among the blind, she asserted
together, regardless of the medium. Some are even that the white cane itself is just a white cane, and
arguing that PwDs should be made private instead what matters is your own confidence. A blind
of public. However, in Alex Wong’s work entitled person cannot do or walk without first building
“Disability Visibility”, based on 140 articles she up their confidence, even with a cane and a guide
collected through her disability visibility project, dog. Haben also mentioned that the disabled have
she has made the case that as if an abled person to confront ablism almost every moment of their
who is visible, a disabled person should also be lives when encountering abled people, responding
given the same space of visibility. In this book, she to questions such as “How are you able to do this,
compiled articles from 37 contributors, which are or that?”, as if the blind are unable to do much.
different in their disabilities, but similar in terms
of their visibility agenda. Her book is divided Keshia Scott wrote “Last But Not Least:
into four sections, on Being, Becoming, Doing, Embracing Asexuality” under Part 2, exploring

25 Vol. 01, Issue 1 | June 2022