Main description:

A historical look at how activists influenced the adoption of more positive, inclusive, and sociopolitical views of disability.

Disability activism has fundamentally changed American society for the better-and along with it, the views and practices of many clinical professionals. After 1945, disability self-advocates and family advocates pushed for the inclusion of more positive, inclusive, and sociopolitical perspectives on disability in clinical research, training, and practice. In Disability Dialogues, Andrew J. Hogan highlights the contributions of disabled people-along with their family members and other allies-in changing clinical understandings and approaches to disability.

Hogan examines the evolving medical, social, and political engagement of three postwar professions-clinical psychology, pediatrics, and genetic counseling-with disability and disability-related advocacy. Professionals in these fields historically resisted adopting a more inclusive and accepting perspective on people with disabilities primarily due to concerns about professional role, identity, and prestige. In response to the work of disability activists, however, these attitudes gradually began to change.

Disability Dialogues provides an important contribution to historical, sociological, and bioethical accounts of disability and clinical professionalization. Moving beyond advocacy alone, Hogan makes the case for why present-day clinical professional fields need to better recruit and support disabled practitioners. Disabled clinicians are uniquely positioned to combine biomedical expertise with their lived experiences of disability and encourage greater tolerance for disabilities among their colleagues, students, and institutions.

Contents:

Preface
Acknowledgements
Introduction. Disability Advocacy in Postwar America
Chapter 1. Clinical Psychology: Evolving Disability Perspectives and Advocacy
Chapter 2. Pediatrics: Moves Toward Leadership in Developmental Disabilities
Chapter 3. Genetic Counseling: Identity and Role in a New Clinical Field
Chapter 4. Advocacy Before Evidence? Disability Controversies in Clinical Psychology
Chapter 5. Developmental Disabilities and Subspecialization in Pediatrics
Chapter 6. Keeping the Conversation Open: Genetic Counseling, Disability, and Selective Abortion
Epilogue. The Need for Disabled Clinical Professionals
Notes
Index