A History of Disability (Corporealities: Discourses of Disability) - Tapa dura

". . . A History of Disability should be read by everyone interested in any aspect of Disability Studies and every library should own a copy. The brilliant conceptualization of disability makes this an indispensable tool in Disability Studies." ---Martha L. Rose, Truman State University, DSQ, Spring 2001 -- (08/07/2001) ". . . provides tools for readers to explore how terms such as 'assimilation, ' 'integration, ' and 'inclusion' came to be so problematic in today's contests over identity. At the same time, it urges us to question our ultimate social and political goals, while asking where our ideals originate and what they say about modern civilization." ---American Historical Review -- (04/05/2004) "[Stiker's] challenge to those of us who are concerned with disability is to question our faith in the desirability of sameness and to challenge the dissolution that that faith requires." ---Cal Montgomery, Ragged Edge, 2001: No. 3 -- (06/07/2001) "Henri-Jacques Stiker's reflection on the exclusion of disabled bodies, the product of vast anthropological, historical, and social research, is a rigorous and passionate meditation. It ranges from the Oedipus myth through the Bible, the Gospels, Islam, mysticism, philosophy, and biology, all the way to current legislation . . . Stiker leads us to see people with disabilities as ourselves---not as machines but as explorers of the impossible." ---Julia Kristeva -- (11/18/1999)

In addressing Western discourse on disability, Stiker examines the cultural assumption that equality/sameness/similarity is always desired by those in society and asserts his own view that difference is not only acceptable but desirable and necessary'