063 - Regional Spotlight Session. Four Decades of Disability and Independent Living Activism in the San Francisco Bay Area

Session Submission Type: Paper Session

Abstract

The session would focus on the origins, development, and impact of the independent living and disability rights movements in the San Francisco Bay Area since the early 1970s. Since the late 1960s, the independent living movement and related disability rights movements have sought to change the lives of tens of millions of Americans with disabilities and of society at large. These movements grew from grass roots efforts around the United States, but actions taken by people with disabilities in Berkeley, Oakland, and San Francisco were especially critical. Since the 1970s, the Bay Area disability community has been a well spring of activism, innovation, and transformational change. The proposed session would offer an overview of how these movements developed in the San Francisco Bay Area, the impact they have had on Americans with disabilities, and the current objectives and challenges faced by the movements.

Sub Unit

• Regional Spotlight

Session Organizer

• Richard K. Scotch, University of Texas-Dallas

Presiders

• Richard K. Scotch, University of Texas-Dallas

• Devva Kasnitz, Association of Higher Education and Disability

Presenters

• Mary Lou Breslin, Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund

• Jessie Lorenz, Independent Living Resource Center, San Francisco

• Corbett Joan O’Toole, Disability Historian

• Alice Wong