Disability Debrief

A break in Berlin, by Sonaksha Dear Debriefers, Just to say that the Debrief takes a breather in August. I'll be in Berlin for some of it, so do get in touch if you're there. As well as having some time off this month, I'll be working to edit an amazing queue of eight (!) drafts of upcoming articles from contributors. Theses are all stories you won't read elsewhere, ranging from hearing voices in Argentina, to seeing disability in Rwanda through its precolonial history.

At a Disability Pride Month march in Warsaw, Poland, on July 18th, 2026. Photo by Neil Milton/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images Dear Debriefers, Happy disability pride month! We're back on a world tour of disability news. Many of the pieces are in a reflective mood, on disability news in the past decade, the twenty years since the UN Convention, or 250 since the birth of the United States.

Under the rain, by Kinanty Andini Dear Debriefers, Greetings from a non-disabled academic based at Scotland’s bonnie University of Dundee! Although I am “non-disabled”, a lot of what I am and what I know I owe to disabled people fighting for independent living. For me it all started in my home country of Bulgaria. But independent living itself, now global in its reach, originated in the United States in the 1960s.

A new kind of clock, by Kinanty Andini Dear Debriefers, What time is it? Our disabilities change the question and its answer. This edition looks at crip time, and some of the other stand-out pieces I've come across in my recent reading. It covers extra time in exams, parenting disabled children, what hearing aids really do, and the concept of “accessibility hindering”.

Ashton, by Kinanty Andini Dear Debriefers, In the past five years I've faced a lot of physical change (by which I mean decline and loss). I started using a wheelchair full-time and now need assistance breathing at night. These changes shut the door on much of the life I used to have before. That's getting older, right? Not according to Ashton Applewhite, a writer and activist challenging ageism.

A portrait of Disability Debrief, by Sonaksha Dear Debriefers, Somehow, this is the 200th edition of Disability Debrief. I sent out the first newsletter just to myself, and then shared the link with colleagues. Some of you have been here since then, others are getting your first Debrief today.

Learning, hands-on: A student reads a braille Quran at an Islamic boarding school, in Banten, Indonesia. February 2026. Photo by Agoes Rudianto/NurPhoto via Getty Images Dear Debriefers, Well it's definitely hot here in the south of England! I hope you're all well and staying cool. This edition takes us back to school with discussions of inclusive education (and the reasons it might not work). From there we see workplace barriers, reforming police forces, and much more in another global tour.

“Dear Disability Diary”, by Kinanty Andini Dear Debriefers, What images pop-up in your diary? Today's edition has a new open call for writing, and opens the Debrief mailbag to see reader responses to recent editions. Readers had quite a bit to say – and different views – on assisted dying (this section is marked clearly). Following that, readers explore questions about organisations that “represent” disabled people.

Breaking free, by Rachel Litchman Dear Debriefers, There is a presumed history of institutions closing in the United States through the 1980s. But the reality is that institutions never disappeared. I know because I lived in them. When I was thirteen years old, I had my first experience with psychiatric and residential institutionalisation. In these places, horrific abuse was the norm.

Din in my head: An explainer bee, dancing elephant, crawling ants, and the octopus around my neck. Illustrations by Fulltime Hedgehog. Priya Debriefers, Everyone else could fall asleep around me, picked up by the sleep-demon. But I stayed behind, awake, a child of five or six years old. And for the first time, I became conscious of the tizzy of uninterrupted internal thoughts, growing to the size of a continent.