This essay is about the direct connection people make between the experience of people of color and the experience of people with disability. Erevelles walks the reader through the pros and cons of this. The author’s argument is that essentially by saying ‘disability is like race’ people are trying to push disability into a broader social recognition as a political minority. Erevelles continues to explain how this has assisted the Disability Rights Movement in moving forward but at the same time created violent and oppressive overtones for disability. She then comes to a conclusion, “Thus, more robust and complex analyses of race and disability are necessary for us to move beyond the initial conceptual space of analogy.” (Erevelles, 148).
I found this essay intriguing, especially as a person of color. I thought it was interesting how the history of disability and race lined up in some ways. For example, Erevelles writes, “They were transformed into spectacles for popular consumption and economic profit” (Erevelles, 146). The best example I can think of this is circuses, originally the circus was a compiled group of ‘freaks’ from around the world. These so-called freaks were people of color and people with disability, put on stage for people to make fun of or laugh at, even sexualizes, so others could make money. I understand why disability and race should not be made a direct analogy, in my mind it belittles both group’s experiences, but I do see how making connections like this help us empathize, learn, and understand each other further. I think another thing that stood out to me was the fact that institutions mix race and disability into one big category, specifically in schools. Erevelles writes, “Special education classes became the spaces where African American and Latino students were ghettoized” (Erevelles, 147). This was something I could connect to because people with color and disability were immediately grouped into the special education classes, and that is one thing that I experienced throughout my life that I look back on now and see as problematic.