07/24/2023

Disability activist Shew (Animal Constructions and Technological Knowledge) asks people to reconsider the assumption that disability is a problem that needs to be solved by technology in this amusing and persuasive polemic. Shew describes technoableism, a word she coined, as a “belief... that considers the elimination of disability a good thing, something we should strive for”—and argues that the mindset is responsible for flawed, ineffective, and inessential technology that most disabled people don’t want or can’t use. For example, cochlear implants are widely portrayed as “curing” deafness in infants, but it often takes years for children using them to learn how to communicate, and they don’t always work, need frequent maintenance, and remove all natural hearing; activists in the Deaf community have pushed back against the medical community’s presumption that Deaf children, by default, require this flawed technology. Rather than assuming disability “is a problem that resides within individual disabled people,” Shew prefers a social model of disability, wherein the problems caused by disability are viewed a structural issue. Questioning whether anyone needs to be fixed at all, Shew posits an alternative way of viewing the world—one where people with disabilities are considered not just the experts on their own bodies but as experts on uncertainty and injustice, who are uniquely qualified to be architects of a more equal future. “We should always be planning with disability in mind,” she writes, “because disability is an inherent part of having squishy meat bodies.” Equally fierce and funny, this will galvanize readers to demand genuine equity for people with disabilities. (Sept.)

"Shew helps readers recognize how deeply [tropes] are ingrained in public conversations about disability.… Against Technoableism contains many lessons."

"Necessary and delightful. Ashley Shew teaches us an important framework for understanding the intersection of technology and ableism with clear prose and incredible charm, as her wry sense of humor jumps off the page."

"Against Technoableism reveals design justice not only for those with disabilities but for everyone who labors and lives with technology. It’s an outstanding book."

"This is a crucial book. Authoritative, witty, thoughtful, and unafraid to throw a punch, Ashley Shew pushes us headlong toward a much-needed world in which disabled people are seen as experts in their lives, curators of their stories, and vibrant, essential, generative parts of our collective future."

"This book is a really big deal, the kind of book that—decades from now—people will still talk about. It marks a before and after. Before the word ‘technoableism’ and after the word ‘technoableism.’ People will say: We did not know what to call it. And then Ashley Shew named it."

"In this series of short, wonderfully lucid essays, [Shew] argues that technoableism – the popular depiction of tech as a wholesale cure for disability – does real damage by positioning the disabled body as fundamentally broken."

"Part memoir, part manifesto . . . this [is] an essential text for the nondisabled to use to educate themselves on the harms of technoableism. Highly recommend."

Maria Pendolino performs this short collection of essays featuring Dr. Ashley Shew's concept of "technoableism," a type of ableist belief that technology can, and should, "cure" disabled people. Shew uses her experience as a chronically ill, hard-of-hearing cancer survivor and amputee to illustrate how technology helps assist her in her everyday life. But, at the same time, technology is not a cure; it's merely a tool that disabled people can use to better their lives. Pendolino delivers the essays in a way that keeps listeners' attention during technical descriptions while also capturing the emotional heart of Shew's ideas. Listeners will find Pendolino's clear and direct narration perfect for gaining a better understanding of new concepts about technology and disability studies. K.D.W. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine

★ 2023-07-06
A powerful manifesto against ableist thinking.

Many nondisabled people think that disabled people just want to be “normal.” As this brief, outstanding text shows, that’s not only wrong, but cruel. Shew, a professor of science, technology, and society at Virginia Tech, lost a leg to cancer at age 30 and suffered damaged hearing and “chemo brain” from the follow-up treatment. The first lie she heard was how wonderful new high-tech prosthetics were. In reality, the simplest, noncomputerized below-the-knee replacement costs $8,000 to $16,000, and all require a lifetime of return visits, adjustments, and replacements. Private insurance and Medicaid will cover some of the cost but never all, so the poor do without. Shew denounces the stereotypical story of a paraplegic “overcoming” a disability by moving around with the aid of new technology even as walking remains difficult. A wheelchair—“the universal icon of disability” that “requires the world to adjust to the disabled person”—is a much better way to get around. Although framed as a denunciation of technoableism, the belief that technical advances will “cure” disability, this book is a more inclusive, intensely squirm-inducing attack on the almost universal conviction that disabled people are broken and require fixing. The author makes a convincing case that their first priority is to get on with their lives and that their leading problem is not technical but social. “The world is set up to exclude disabled people,” writes Shew, and readers who insist they are an exception will crumble before her list of the disability clichés that saturate the media. There are the “pitiable freaks,” in which “disabled people are cast as either objects of curious medical interest or as objects of pity and charity”; the “shameful sinners,” a trope that “frames disability as a punishment or penance for some kind of sinful action”; and the “inspirational overcomers,” sometimes known as “inspiration porn” in the disability community.

Essential reading for the disabled and nondisabled alike.