Disability Justice
RESOURCE DIRECTORY
This is a (non-exhaustive, ever evolving) curation of disability justice tools and resources, compiled by the CFM team. As an organization, we have had the deep privilege of learning about Disability Justice by some extraordinary teachers, especially through our former core team member, Stacey Park Milbern, as well as our long-term collaborator/guest facilitator/care team member/access lead India Harville. We have created this resource to honor what we’ve learned from them, and many others along the way, to help keep the learning and the movement going.
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Creating Freedom Movements #MoreJusticeMoreJoy
Published May 28, 2022
Last Updated: May 06, 2025 at approximately 8:06 PM EST.
If you are looking for specific resources and/or want to make a contribution to this list you may do so via our submission form here. If you have used or shared this resource, we ask that you consider making a donation in support of our work at Creating Freedom Movements, here.
What is Disability Justice?
The term Disability Justice was coined out of conversations between Patty Berne and Mia Mingus, which later expanded to include Leroy Moore, Eli Clare, Stacey Park Milbern, and Sebastian Margaret.[1] The goal of the Disability Justice framework was to challenge radical and progressive movements to fully include disabled folks. The DJ framework & movement also challenges the largely white disability rights movements to become more intersectional: or to deal with racial, gender, and economic justice as these intersect with ableism.
Disability Justice is now largely defined as a socio-political movement which focuses on examining disability and ableism as they relate to other forms of oppression and identity such as race, class and gender. It was developed in 2005 by the Disability Justice Collective, a group including Patty Berne, Mia Mingus, Stacey Park Milbern, Leroy F. Moore Jr., and Eli Clare.
"Disability Justice was built because the Disability Rights Movement and Disability Studies do not inherently centralize the needs and experiences of folks experiencing intersectional oppression, such as disabled people of color, immigrants with disabilities, queers with disabilities, trans and gender non-conforming people with disabilities, people with disabilities who are houseless, people with disabilities who are incarcerated, people with disabilities who have had their ancestral lands stolen, amongst others." (Source)
Disability justice recognizes the intersecting legacies of white supremacy, colonial capitalism, gendered oppression and ableism in understanding how people's bodies and minds are labeled ‘deviant’, ‘unproductive’, ‘disposable’ and/or ‘invalid’.
Honoring Stacey Park Milbern
Stacey Park Milbern[2] was a Korean-American disability rights activist and beloved team member at Creating Freedom Movements. Stacey had been in movement leadership roles since she was 16 years old; most of her writing and political work focused on her experiences at the intersections of race, (dis)ability, gender and sexuality. She helped create the Disability Justice movement and advocated for fair treatment of disabled people across intersectional, marginalized identities. Stacey worked with Sins Invalid, a performance project that celebrates artists with disabilities and is led by disabled, queer BIPOC and GNC people. She has trained many community organizations and served as an appointed advisor to the Obama administration for two years. She also founded the Disability Justice Culture Club, an activist house in East Oakland designed with accessibility in mind, that serves as a gathering place for disabled BIPOC community via events, meetings, and meals.
Compiled by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha and Alice Wong, this is “a syllabus with a small sample of Stacey’s work through interviews, blog posts, videos, and more. Although she has become an ancestor, the ways she taught us about disability justice, love, organizing and so much more are her living legacy on this planet. We can keep her present by sharing and practicing what we learned from her. The #StaceyTaughtUs hashtag was created by members of the Radical Monarchs, an activism organization for young girls of color. Stacey taught the disability justice curriculum at the Radical Monarchs for the past several years.”
Stacey was honored on May 19, 2022 through the Google Doodle. You can also read “Honoring Stacey Park Milbern and her dream for a more inclusive world”, with contributions from Stacey’s friends and family. We are grateful for Stacey’s wisdom, passion and guidance during her time as part of the CFM core team and now, as an ancestor. It was only right to begin our DJ Resource Directory with an honoring of Stacey, her life’s love work & legacy. With respect & love, in remembrance and joy: we thank you Stacey.
*NEW + UNDER CONSTRUCTION* Beloved Crip Ancestors
In the years since our initial publication of this living resource directory, the COVID-19 pandemic has been allowed to wreak havoc, particularly amongst Disability Community. In recent years, many beloved Disability Organizers, Educators, Practitioners, and dearly & deeply beloved community members have transitioned into Crip Ancestors, much of this prompted by systemic harm like ableism, Global Capitalism, the Medical Industrial Complex, Medical Racism & Fatphobia, and several additional interlocking systems of harm. Just as we celebrate and cherish all that we have learned from Stacey Park Milbern, we know there are several beloved Crip Community Members and Ancestors whose presence and work towards Disability Justice deserves to be recognized, remembered, cherished, and celebrated. This is our small offering towards that.
*This is a new section, under construction. We will share more about this project, soon! As always, you can offer feedback or suggestions through our submission form. If there are folks you would like to honor here, you can indicate so on the form — but please do know we plan to reach out directly and create a separate modality to help us build our Digital Altar in 2025.
DJ Tools for Organizations
This section outlines tools & resources for organizations who are interested in improving their organizations knowledge & incorporation of disability justice frameworks.
- aimed at helping Black, Indigenous and POC-led organizations (that are not primarily focused around disability) examine where they’re at in practicing disability justice, and where they want to learn and grow. It includes questions for self-assessment, links to access tools, organizational stories and more.
- written by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha and envisioned by Stacey Park Milbern and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha.
- Access at above link (for free!) by filling out the download form.
- ‘A Primer on Working With Disabled Group Members for Feminist / Activist Groups & Organisations’ was a toolkit featured in the 2022 #CripRitual exhibit. This primer was created with the hope that it would “help to promote improved inclusivity within feminist / activist communities.” Free copies were given out to interested gallery guests & made available online.
- By Romily Alice Walden
- Created by Showing Up for Racial Justice, this resource provides guidelines about specific ways to increase basic accessibility for your chapter and organizing. One type of access does not fit all, yet what has proven true is that increased disability specific access benefits everyone and particularly increases the involvement and relevance for people from marginalized communities; there will be no complete liberation without it.
- This resource from Disability & Philanthropy Forum covers the importance of accessibility and how you can implement accessible practices throughout your organization’s operations.
- This resource from Disability & Philanthropy Forum covers how you can make your grants more inclusive and accessible to and for disabled peoples.
DJ Resources for Individuals
This section outlines tools & resources for individuals who are interested in improving their own knowledge & incorporation of disability justice frameworks.
Readings:
Contextualizing Disability Justice
- Modalities of Disability (models of (or lens through which to view) disability)
- BioMedical/Individual Model
- Admin Model of Disability
- Various models of Disability are briefly explored, here.
- Charity Model of Disability
- Social Model
- Disability Rights
- Disability Justice (this entire guide!)
Ableism & Disability Justice
Accessibility & Inclusion
State Violence & Disability Justice
Incarceration
Police Violence
Race & Disability (wrt state violence)
Desirability and Sexuality
Palestine & Disability Justice
- Disability Divest: We Demand the Disability Establishment End Its Relationships with War Profiteers.
- Drawing on a stunning array of theoretical and methodological frameworks, Puar uses the concept of “debility”—bodily injury and social exclusion brought on by economic and political factors—to disrupt the category of disability. She shows how debility, disability, and capacity together constitute an assemblage that states use to control populations. Puar's analysis culminates in an interrogation of Israel's policies toward Palestine, in which she outlines how Israel brings Palestinians into biopolitical being by designating them available for injury. Supplementing its right to kill with what Puar calls the right to maim, the Israeli state relies on liberal frameworks of disability to obscure and enable the mass debilitation of Palestinian bodies. Tracing disability's interaction with debility and capacity, Puar offers a brilliant rethinking of Foucauldian biopolitics while showing how disability functions at the intersection of imperialism and racialized capital.
Toolkits/Resources:
- Educational resource about the origins of disability justice as a movement & framework provided by Disability & Philanthropy Forum.
- This ‘crip ritual dream workbook’ by Alexa Dexa is a free resource about dreams and dreaming as a crip ritual. In her words, “idyllic dreamic is a form of joy, a form of survival, a form of self and communal care, a way to reimagine the present and the future in order to build the interdependent communities of care we want to grow with, sustain, nurture, and be nurtured by. Dreaming is immensely valuable for our collective and personal liberation and safety.”
- This DJ resource compiled by Project LETS offers introductory readings & videos as well as a Disability Justice curricula adapted from POC Online Classroom. Project LETS is a national grassroots organization and movement led by and for folks with lived experience of mental illness/madness, Disability, trauma, & neurodivergence.
- This disability justice toolkit by Washington Peace Center contains tips on being an ally, making your events & movements accessible, organizations to support and history and culture of the Disability Justice movement.
- These resources provide an introduction to Disability Justice politics, practice and access in order for us to build our capacity to engage disability activists with relevancy and respect. SURJ recognizes this resource as a collective effort birthed by countless disability activists and community members fighting to insert access, disability, self determination and justice into able-bodied spaces.
Disability Justice Media (Misc.)
Films/Documentaries
- A groundbreaking summer camp for teens with disabilities proves so inspiring that a group of its alumni join the radical disability rights movement to advocate for historic legislation changes.
- An oral history told largely through archival footage, Lives Worth Living, is a PBS documentary exploring the roots of the disability justice movement post WWII. Through demonstrations and inside legislative battles, the disability rights community secured equal civil rights for people with disabilities.
- Elite athletes and insiders reflect on the Paralympic Games and examine how they impact a global understanding of disability, diversity and excellence.
- Call to action: Support the 2022 ‘Rising Phoenix’ Grammy campaign featuring music by artists from Krip Hop Nation (learn more)
- a documentary film by Bonnie Sherr Klein about persons with disabilities. Produced in 2006 by the National Film Board of Canada, it is Klein's first film since a catastrophic stroke in 1987 left her a quadriplegic.
Podcasts
Videos
Books (for purchase)
DJ Advocates & Educators
This section covers some major names & organizations in the larger disability justice movement. As always, if you’d like to contribute someone’s work please do so at our submission link.
- India is a Disability Justice Consultant, public speaker, performance artist, politicized healer, and the founder of Embraced Body. As the founder of Embraced Body, India helps people center Disability Justice based embodiment practices into every aspect of their lives. Services offered include public speaking, educational workshops, disability justice centered dance/performance, disability justice/access consulting.
Connect via: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Website, Twitter.
P.S. Check out these #CFMWorkshopHighlights to learn more about India and JJ’s offerings for both the 2023-24 CFM Cohort: Nervous System Regulation & Group Dynamics, Exploring Disability Justice, Accessibility, If You Can Breathe, You Can Dance.
- Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
- Asian-American poet, writer, educator and social activist. Their writing and performance art focuses on documenting the stories of queer and trans people of color, abuse survivors, mixed-race people and diasporic South Asians and Sri Lankans.
- Connect via: Facebook, Instagram, Website.
- Imani Barbarin is a disability rights and inclusion activist and speaker who uses her voice and social media platforms to create conversations engaging the disability community. Born with cerebral palsy, Imani often writes and uses her platform to speak from the perspective of a disabled black woman.
- Connect via: Instagram, Twitter, Website.
- Disability Justice Culture Club
- Disabled QTPOC house in East Oakland. Revolution & chill.
- Connect via: Facebook, Instagram.
- emerging philanthropy-serving organization with a mission centering the perspectives of disabled people while engaging philanthropy on a collective journey to understand disability inclusion as key to advancing social justice. Here you can find: insights on disability history + community + culture, guidance on how to make your operations more accessible, steps to take toward inclusive grantmaking, videos spotlighting perspectives of disabled leaders, and more!
- Embraced Body is driven by a profound commitment to fostering accessibility and inclusivity for multiply marginalized Disabled individuals. Through our performance, teaching, consulting, and events, we aim to empower individuals to recognize the interconnectedness of ableism with other forms of oppression, including white supremacy, homophobia, gender injustice, and classism. By addressing these systemic inequalities head-on, we endeavor to dismantle oppressive structures and create a more equitable society for all.
Visit embracedbody.com to learn more & follow @embracedbody1 on socials!
At Creating Freedom Movements, we have the pleasure and privilege of welcoming India Harville and JJ Omelagah to Our 2025 Cohort Team:
As a Disability Justice consultant, public speaker, somatics practitioner, and performance artist, India Harville has made it her mission over the past 20 years to open people's minds to the wonder of their own bodies. In 2016, she founded what is now known as Embraced Body, an organization that began by providing accessible classes to Disabled communities. Since then, the’ve made affirming art funded by major philanthropic organizations and trained countless teams on accessibility and Disability Justice.
As Program Director at Embraced Body, JJ also serves as the Head Coordinator of Access for Embraced Body. JJ’s access coordination is grounded in over a decade of experience as a Personal Care Attendant. They have over ten years of experience as an Access Doula, providing access support and coordinating access services for both virtual and in person events. They have coordinated access services for a number of community organizations — most recently, with Creating Freedom Movements! We are thrilled to have the support of India Harville & JJ Omelagah of Embraced Body as part of our Access Team for the duration of our 2025 Alumni Cohort!
P.S. Check out #2025CFMWorkshopHighlights to learn more about EB’s offerings in our Alumni Cohort, including: Nervous System Tending and Working Through Access Puzzles in Shared Spaces.
- Supernova Momma is run by Natasha ‘Tash’ or the ‘SuperNova Momma’ with the mission of helping Black and Neurodiverse people break generational curses from systemic racism and ableism in households, schools, and offices to receive support in a mutually caring, empathetic, and respectful environment.
- Connect Via: Twitter, Instagram, YouTube.
- blog by Mrs. Kermina Çevik, the parent of an Autistic child. She says this blog is for her son, not necessarily about him, but part of her “activism and exploration of what it means to try and ally myself to his cause.” This blog is a journey of exploration, a commitment to respect and show of love: a way to learn together.
- An online project that amplifies stories of disabilities.
- Krip Hop is a project featuring people with disabilities inside and outside the music industry, locally and globally.
- Blog by disability justice activist Mia Mingus
- A magazine for disabled women and non-binary people.
- An educational project focused on “unseen” or invisible disabilities.
- Archived FRIDA blog which was active from 2005-2009. This blog would share news and thoughts about feminist disability rights issues, to fight back against sexism and ableism.
- The Los Angeles or LA Spoonie Collective offers virtual and in-person workshops and panel discussions on the intersections of race, gender, and disability, Disability Justice, feminist theory, and more. submitted by Jen V.
Accessibility Tools, Knowledge & Resources (Misc.)
This section covers a variety of topics related to accessibility in general: namely best practices, & the open access movement. Many of these resources are miscellaneous and/or did not fit neatly into the above categories.
- Digital Accessibility: Best Practices
- CFM is in the process of finalizing our guide (will likely release in June/July) but until then, have included some articles related to this topic, largely about alt text.
- A document published in 2008 by Aaron Swartz in support of the Open Access Movement, a movement to remove barriers & paywalls that may prohibit the general public from accessing scientific research publications, or rather knowledge in general.
- Brief guide to bypassing paywalls here.
- A brief guide with information on how to access paywalled sites (eg. JSTOR, news publications, etc.) compiled by Rads.
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Creating Freedom Movements #MoreJusticeMoreJoy
Published May 28, 2022
Last Updated: May 06, 2025, 8:06 PM EST.
If you are looking for specific resources and/or want to make a contribution to this list you may do so via this form.
PLEASE NOTE: In our efforts to keep knowledge accessible and in line with the #OpenAccessMovement, we have included links to free downloads and/or PDFs whenever possible. If you see a * by the title, this means this tool or resource is currently available for a one time fee, we have included the most affordable link we could find at the time of last update. We believe in compensating people for their labor. We remind and encourage folks to purchase resources and contribute financially as they are able to.
If you have used or shared this resource, we ask that you consider making a donation in support of our work at Creating Freedom Movements, here.
[1] This information is sourced from the Sins Invalid Disability Justice Primer. Support Sins Invalid by purchasing the primer here.
[2] The above bio is an adapted excerpt of the bio written by Stacey when she became a Core Team member of Creating Freedom Movements. We mourn her untimely passing on May 19, 2020. You can learn more about Stacey and her work through #StaceyTaughtUs. She was featured as the Google Doodle on May 19th, 2022 on her 35th birthday.