“In the United States, we’re taught that nakedness is a very intimate and private thing. Yet, I have to show people my body every day to receive the assistance I need,” writes Ashley Volion, a wheelchair-using disability rights activist, in Disability Intimacy. “I have to be vulnerable in ways that other people wouldn’t even dream of. Intimacy means something deeper.”
Her contribution is one of many delightful reminders that Alice Wong’s third (and boldest) anthology is anchored in authentic experiences of disabled people and intimacy, rather than stereotypes.
Disabled editor Wong, who won a prestigious MacArthur Foundation genius grant, worth US$800,000, last year, has long been interested in this kind of representation. She has had muscular dystrophy “my entire life” and founded the Disability Visibility project just over a decade ago, in 2014.
