Disability and impairment

This entry introduces the field of critical disability studies. The entry begins by providing a brief overview of the emergence of this field, acknowledging the ways in which disability and impairment differ as conceptual categories. It considers, first, the need to move between public and private understandings of these categories through a discussion of embodiment and the psychoemotional. Second, it examines an emergent approach – dis/ability studies – which interrogates the dual processes of disableism and ableism. Third, it focuses on a distinct aspect of life – sex and sexuality – and explores this in reference to dis/ability. The entry concludes with some ideas about generative social theory.