A Matter of Dignity: Changing the World of the Disabled [Hardcover]

Andrew Potok (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 29, 2002

From A Matter of Dignity:

I realized that I needed to learn about the legislative and legal aspects of disability as much as I did about our feelings regarding wholeness, beauty and ugliness, about the state called normalcy, about liberating technologies and therapies, about the role of the disabled in history and literature.

And what could better inform and enlighten me than contact with people who help create access, who elicit change via care, support, teaching, and study as their life’s work?

As it turned out, I have learned from them that, in spite of the American addiction to youthfulness, “normalcy,” virility, activity, and physical beauty, diversity in all its forms provides not only fascination but strength. Diversity tends toward higher forms, uniformity toward dullness and extinction. What could make more sense than to value all that is diverse, unexpected, and exuberantly impure?

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Insight and nuance underlie much of this investigation into the situation of disabled Americans today. Potok (Ordinary Daylight), who has the degenerative eye disease retinitis pigmentosa, shapes his informative and wittily written survey around a series of 13 interview/profiles of disability activists of various backgrounds and interests: e.g., lawyer Chai Feldblum, who pioneered AIDS and race-based civil rights legislation and now does disability law; Connie Tomaino, who works for Oliver Sacks and studies "neurological aspects of music"; Dave Loney, who makes prostheses. While careful not to present a completely cheery portrait of the world of the disabled, offering the history of eugenics in U.S. thought and law, and accounts of guide dogs who can "smell, shed, get ill, [or] revert to deeply ingrained beastly behavior," Potok discusses such positive developments as the new academic Society for Disability Studies, the ever evolving politics of the Americans with Disability Act, and the invention of the "talking computer" program JAWS (Job Accessibility with Speech). Covering medical, legal and psychological issues in depth and with intellectual vigor, the most provocative of Potok's work is his examination "about our feelings regarding wholeness, beauty, and ugliness [and] about the state called normalcy," making the book less about changing the world of the disabled than about in re-imagining the world in which we all live. (Feb. 4)Forecast: Potok's broad-spectrum, people-based approach works terrifically to draw readers into the issues, and can be recommended especially to those who have endured any sort of recent health or life setback. Anyone interested in the intersection of law and activism will find points of interest.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Review

“Covering medical, legal and psychological issues in depth and with intellectual vigor, the most provocative of Potok's work is his examination ‘about our feelings regarding wholeness, beauty, and ugliness [and] about the state called normalcy,’ making the book less about changing the world of the disabled than about in re-imagining the world in which we all live.”
— Publishers Weekly

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Bantam; 1St Edition edition (January 29, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553802151
• ISBN-13: 978-0553802153
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,787,399 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Terrific-Should Change Lives of Many Disabled & Nondisabled, April 27, 2002

By 

Art Blaser (Orange, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Matter of Dignity: Changing the World of the Disabled (Hardcover)

I surprised myself by liking this book so much. I bristle at any suggestion that because I'm disabled my life needs changing, and gagged at the description of the book as "inspiring" on the dust jacket.

Potok has chapters on some people I was familiar with (through writings) and others not. Among them are Chai Feldblum, Mary Lou Breslin, Ted Henter (creator of JAWS software, Adrienne Asch, Rosemarie Garland Thomson, and others. There's lots of fascinating information, but not the simplistic suggestion that the rest of us could (or should) make equivalent contributions if only we tried hard enough. Potok, a blind painter, and most of his interviewees are too socially conscious for that. They recognize the deep-rooted nature of inequality inside and outside the United States, and that some people are making a difference.
Potok, like us all, is capable of saying things that are wrong (p. 219: "Most of the disabled {in the Third World} use wheelchairs") [Millions with brain damage from malnutrition, and millions with PTSD from natural and human-made disasters haven't had their disabilities diagnosed] and others that make sense, but it's unclear where the information is from (also p. 219: "90 percent of those who need {wheelchairs} don't have them.")

But the book is certain to bring important ideas to a general readership. Potok is brilliant in writing about disability as a component of diversity. His introspection and learning from his interviewees is evident. Readers will have the privilege of learning from his interviewees and from Potok. I know that I did.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A book for disabled and able-bodied people alike., December 20, 2004

By 

Donna Jones "feistygirl" (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: A Matter of Dignity: Changing the World of the Disabled (Hardcover)

I'm a 28 year old disabled woman, and I've found myself wanting to get in touch with those in my community and the issues that affect our lives. This book opened my eyes to thoughts and ideas that had never occured to me, I felt ignorant and ashamed at myself, but glad I've realized where I am lacking. It's a beautiful book written by a curious author who is wonderfully honest about the hard changes he's endured emotionally and physically as he adapts to his blindness. The people he chose to interview excited, angered, enthralled and inspired me. There's so much left to do in the disability community to raise awareness and if it doesn't start with those of us who are living with the disability, it should. I loved this book for teaching me so much about the disability movement and giving me the momentum to search out how I can help those like me more.

5.0 out of 5 stars reveiw, February 8, 2009

By 

chi09 - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Matter of Dignity: Changing the World of the Disabled (Hardcover)

very good book on critical biographies of people from different professions but working on disability rights and advocacy.
delivery was superfast.