The Disability History Museum

To discuss this museum, ask questions, or ask for information in another format, contact: 

Dr. Lauren Obermark, Associate Professor of English at University of Missouri-St. Louis 

obermarkl@umsl.edu

This museum is designed by an undergraduate and graduate English courses focused on Disability Studies. Disability studies is an interdisciplinary field and activist orientation that approaches disability as an identity, culture, and social justice issue. As an approach and methodology, disability studies challenges assumptions that disability is a defecit or solely a medical "problem" in need of a "cure."

Even more, this museum focuses on what is known as disability justice, meaning the creators of the museum work to center disability as a lived experience that is always connected to other identities and social issues. 

As queer, Black, disabled, feminist theorist Audre Lorde once powerfully said, “There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.” The disability museum strives to embody Lorde’s insight.

Each page of this website hosts a specific exhibit about disability history. 

On a computer, those exhibits are found on the top of the page; you will also need to click the "more" button to see all the exhibits. 

On a phone, click the "hamburger" button (three lines) to expand and see all the exhibits. 

Some of the pages use collapsible headers that you need to click and expand to see all the text and images.

The content of each exhibit varies considerably, but we have tried to follow an organizational template to offer cohesion across the museum. 

We have worked hard to make this museum accessible, including attentiveness to image descriptions, alt text, captions, and high contrast design. 

At the same time, we know accessibility is a process, always ongoing. And we are all always learning to do better. If you find parts of the museum are not accessible for you, please reach out to Dr. Lauren Obermark via email; obermarkl@umsl.edu

You can view the assignment sheet we used to launch the Disability Museum here (2021). This assignment looks different and evolves across every class that works to build out the Disability History Museum. For instance, 2024 and 2026 versions of the assignment draw on local archives.

Educators are welcome to adapt it for their own purposes as long as they cite our website in their work. 

Disability History Inspiration 

Many sources are cited in each exhibit, but this project is particularly indebted to: 

• Kim Nielsen's A Disability History of the United States

and 

• Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution (free & publicly available on Netflix's documentary YouTube channel)