Disability cultural centers: How colleges can move beyond access to inclusion

Abstract

College campuses often house various centers that serve students with different minority identities by providing both a safe space for these students as well as cultural validation. However, it is rare to find centers that specifically serve students with disabilities in this same way. Instead, university services for students with disabilities tend to focus on fulfilling legal requirements of access. In this article, I describe how a Disability Cultural Center was established at my home institution. Currently, only a handful of Disability Cultural Centers exist across the globe. Such centers can play a critical role in shifting the conversation from legal rights to the validation and expression of disability culture. Students with disabilities make up a sizable proportion of college undergraduates. Universities are thus uniquely poised to lead communities in the explicit acknowledgement and support of disability culture.