Reviewed by Kate Champlin
Yu’s The Anti-Ableist Manifesto will inform and challenge readers whether they are experienced disability activists or newly introduced to disability justice. The author blends disability history, current disability advocacy, and her personal experience of disability. The result is a comprehensive guide that links the personal and political with the past, present, and future. I recommend that we leave copies of this book in the waiting rooms of clinics and disability “aid” offices for recently disabled readers and their loved ones. I recommend that teachers of Introduction to Disability Studies classes consider using this book as their first course textbook. The Anti-Ableist Manifesto will provide all readers with a solid grounding in and a practical guide to disability justice.
Yu divides her work into three sections. The first provides general information about the disability justice movement and its history. This section acknowledges that ableism (including internalized ableism) pervades our culture and offers simple actions that readers can take to free themselves from their preconceived notions. These actions include diversifying their online newsfeeds and recognizing their own privilege so that they can use it more constructively. In the chapter entitled “Recognize and Use Your Privilege,” Yu acknowledges that cultural privilege can cause guilt, freely identifies her own sources of privilege, and shows us several examples of privilege used positively. For instance, Yu states:
At Diversability, I’ve leaned into the social capital I’ve built from my collective work experience to provide job references and write letters of recommendation for our team members when they are ready to pursue their next opportunity—and many have gone on to get their dream jobs, scholarships, and internships. (70)
Since Diversability is a company which advances disability pride and leadership, it attracts disabled workers. By helping her employees to advance in the workforce, Yu also fulfills her stated goals of helping disabled workers to overcome economic barriers and of introducing the workforce to disabled employees. As Yu points out, many employers fail to realize that disabled workers can bring creativity and value to their companies. When disabled people are given a fair chance in the workforce, their mere presence can help to change employer perspectives. In this sense, Yu uses her relative privilege to create both communal change and change in the wider culture. Her example also reframes identity privilege into a potential source of positive change. This approach will likely be particularly relevant and helpful to readers who perceive identity privilege only as negative or as a source of inherited guilt. As Arken Hamilton puts it:
I think when some people hear the word privilege, they get defensive, but I’m here to tell you that having privilege, or being privileged, is not the problem. Entitlement is the problem…. Privilege is a hand-me-down heirloom, rooted in the circumstances you’re born into; entitlement is something you procure and choose to wear. (qtd. in Yu 69)
Yu’s second section demonstrates other ways to promote disability justice on a community level. She gives valuable advice on disrupting witnessed microaggressions, an issue that many would-be allies wrestle with. Yu recommends asking questions such as “what do you mean when you say that?” or making comments such as “that’s not okay” (100-105). Yu also teaches us how to avoid inadvertently committing microaggressions. She warns against unstated assumptions, unsolicited prayers for disabled individuals, and patronizing attempts to help. Yu particularly recounts moments when able-bodied neighbors (who may have honestly wanted to help) engaged in acts that came across as condescending or infantilizing. These microaggressions, Yu suggests, were also rooted in unexamined assumptions about what disabled people need from those around them. In one case, Yu recalls:
A few years ago, I boarded a train in Switzerland. The luggage storage was nestled in between and under the seats. As I tilted my luggage over on its side and prepared to slide it under, a fellow passenger pushed me aside and shoved my luggage in. Then he turned to me and said, “You should really ask for help.” (113)
One of Yu’s disabilities is a traumatic brachial plexus injury, a severe nerve injury that paralyzes her right arm. Her luggage-loading technique may seem a bit unconventional. The expression of “unusual” embodiment did not mean, however, that Yu had lost control of the situation. She certainly did not need to be shoved or lectured on basic self-care. The disability etiquette rules presented in this section include always assume competence, ask before you attempt to help, and listen to the disabled person’s answer. If the man on the train had done any of the above, his encounter with Yu might have resulted in real allyship or genuine understanding.
Yu’s third subsection discusses common and society-wide forms of disability discrimination. These injustices include what many advocates call the disability tax. The extra cost of disability life hacks, adaptive equipment, and accommodations is rarely considered or charted, but it is constantly present. Yu notes that her cutting board—which holds itself in place with suction cups—cost her seventy-five dollars. Non-adapted cutting boards are generally between 20 and 50 dollars cheaper.
The list of current injustices also includes the continuing inaccessibility of digital and physical spaces. As Yu points out, inaccessible spaces represent both a barrier and a message for disabled people. Inaccessibility tells us that we are not welcome or wanted. Inaccessibility continues despite the fact that universal design benefits everyone. To prove this point, Yu uses the example of curb cuts for wheelchair users and the effects of curb cuts on those with strollers, carts, or wheeled luggage. Yu notes that closed captions for the deaf and hard-of-hearing are also useful to those watching videos in noisy rooms. Finally, Yu discusses the joys of access intimacy, the moments when those around her understand and honor her access needs. Access intimacy exists without begrudging talk of special treatment or unnecessary exclusion. Alice Wong, Mia Mingus, and Sandy Ho sum up both the current situation and the real nature of access intimacy, saying:
Access should be a collective responsibility, instead of the sole responsibility of it being placed on one or two individuals. It is all of our responsibility to…[center] access as a core part of the way that we want to live in the world together—as a core part of our liberation. (qtd. In Yu 186)
The Anti-Ableist Manifesto provides solid information about the disability justice movement, its history, and its current concerns. The guide offers (often) simple techniques for eradicating ableism and its consequences within ourselves, our communities, and our society. It is destined to become a go-to text in Disability Studies. Yu’s introduction states that she hoped to write a book when she was in high school and that that dream remained in the back of her mind for decades. This book was worth a lifetime of dreaming.
Title: The Anti-Ableist Manifesto: Smashing Stereotypes, Forging Change, and Building a Disability-Inclusive World
Author: Tiffany Yu
Publisher: Hachette Books
Date: 2024
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About the Reviewer
Kate Champlin (she/her) is a late-deafened adult and a graduate of Ball State University (Indiana). She currently works as a writing tutor and as a contract worker for BK International Education Consultancy, a company whose aim is to normalize the success of underserved students.