Disability Pride: Resource Guide

Overview

Disability Pride affirms and honors the lives, contributions and achievements of people with disabilities, both visible and invisible. Library resources for deepening understanding of disability, ableism and disability justice are many: A keyword search of our collection returns more than 1,500 relevant items.

To facilitate the search for materials, this resource guide identifies highlights in and beyond the library’s collections, including books, database content, websites, educator resources and recordings of relevant past programs. It also includes a brief discussion of Disability Pride Month, which occurs in July, as a time when recognizing the dignity of people with disabilities, and enhancing their sense of belonging in our communities, is encouraged.

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#educators

Resources for Educators

See the materials below for potential starting points for engaging learners. You’ll find digital tools, primary source collections, and more.

• PBS documentaries treating the disability rights movement and activists’ lives.
• The National Endowment for the Humanities’ (NEH) Virtual Bookshelf for Disability Pride Month features a list of NEH-funded projects.
• Word Gathering is a digital, open access journal of disability poetry, literature and the arts.
• The Poetry Foundation’s Disability Poetics explores disability in modern and contemporary poetry.
• The Disability Visibility Project is an online community dedicated to creating, sharing and amplifying disability media and culture.
• Berkley’s Disability Rights and Independent Living Movement Project, launched in 1996, captures the history of a remarkable movement by people with disabilities to win legally defined civil rights and control over their own lives. 
• Rooted in Rights uses accessible digital media to shift mainstream narratives on disability issues.
• Sins Invalid explores themes of disabled embodiment and the world around us, developing provocative work where paradigms of “normal” and “disabled” are challenged. Instead, a vision of beauty and justice inclusive of all bodies and communities is offered.
• Disability Studies Quarterly (DSQ) is the journal of the Society for Disability Studies (SDS).

#programs

Past Programs at the Library

Past programs held at the library relevant to Disability Pride are available on our YouTube channel. Featured below are several recent programs.

Presented in partnership by Princeton Public Library and the Princeton University Humanities Council, and co-sponsored by the Lewis Center for the Arts and the Being Human Festival (US) 2026, poets Katie Farris and Ilya Kaminsky offer a collaborative presentation of their works on deafness, the challenges of facing cancer, and the war in Ukraine.

Classicist and translator Emily Wilson and Pasquale Toscano, joined in conversation moderated by Sophie Gee, explores how epic compares to other literary genres both in scope and scale, treating how heroism and ableism are reinforced and destabilized within the Homeric poems. Presented in partnership by Princeton Public Library, Princeton Classics, the Princeton University Department of English and the Princeton University Humanities Council.

Christopher “Unpezverde” Núñez, a choreographer, dramaturg, educator and disability advocate speaks about his experience as an undocumented Central American immigrant with moderator Marielys “Lely” Burgos Meléndez, advocate, artistic researcher, somatic educator, writer and audio describer. The discussion explores the intersection of the politics of immigration, indigeneity, artistry, gender and disability. The speakers will also consider the role that disability and heritage play in the development of new aesthetics in art-making. Presented in partnership by Princeton Public Library and The Lewis Center for the Arts.

#month

Disability Pride Month

Disability Pride Month is observed annually in July and is an opportunity to celebrate and honor the lives, accomplishments and experiences of those belonging to the disability community.

The July commemoration stems from the historic legislation signed by President George H.W. Bush on July 26, 1990: the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This legislation resulted from many years of effort and collaboration among persons with disabilities, representatives and their staff on Capitol Hill, as well as civil servants working in federal agencies.

An outline of that legislation’s history is available at the ADA 2024 website, where the “In Their Own Words” series brings together narratives and audio-visual testimonies about the process through which the legislation came before Congress and the president.