I've learned that disability pushes us to examine ourselves and the difficult questions about the American past. Which peoples and which bodies have … - Kim E. Nielsen

As an author I'm careful about the words that I use. Words matter. For example, characterizing someone as "wheelchair bound" or "confined to a wheelchair" is profoundly different than characterizing them as a "wheelchair user" or "wheelchair rider." The differentiation is not political correctness: it is an entirely different ideological and intellectual framework of comprehension. The contemporary disability-rights movement has understood that redefining and reclaiming language is central to self-direction, just as it has been for feminist; lesbian, gay, queer, and transgender; and racial freedom movements.

...disability is often elusive and changing. Not only do people with disabilities have a history, but the concept of disability has a history as well.

abolitionists often talked about the way that slavery was disabling both of body and mind, and thus used that argument to argue against slavery, and saying that African Americans needed to be rescued from slavery. So, you know, both the pros and cons of slavery are the people who were argued against and the people who argued for it used disability to talk about slavery.