While acknowledging the importance of disability rights, the benefits the movement gave, to Berne and their collaborators, are precarious. “Rights can be ‘granted’ and taken away. … Justice is about how we live and love and practice everyday interactions. It’s not something that can be taken away.”
In 2025, a quarter was released in her honor as part of the American Women Quarters Program, a partnership between the United States Mint and the Smithsonian American Women’s History Museum that seeks to recognize the contributions of American women throughout history.
Stacey’s belief that we all have a responsibility to participate in one another’s liberation and well-being is part of the larger Disability Justice tenet of interdependence: We are all dependent on one another, no one is truly independent, and none of us have to go it alone.
One of Patty’s most central teachings was how valuable each of us are, with all our complications. “A Disability Justice framework,” Patty famously wrote, “understands that all bodies are unique and essential, that all bodies have strengths and needs that must be met. We know that we are powerful not despite the complexities of our bodies, but because of them.”
“If we want to create a campus that’s fully accessible and anti-ableist, we have to think about integrating these principles in all aspects,” said Chronister, a member of the AUCD. “Whether it’s admissions, campus surveys, events, we can’t silo disability into one service.”
Currently, Kafer is based in Texas, and she provided insight and examples on the current issues relating to reproductive justice faced by people with disabilities in Texas.
June 9, 2019. Ali Stroker wins Best Featured Actress in a Musical at the 73rd Annual Tony Awards. An actor, singer, and wheelchair user, Ali Stroker has been a trailblazer for disability representation on the stage. She was the first wheelchair user to graduate from the Tisch School of the Arts Drama Department at New York University. In 2015, she was the first wheelchair user to appear on Broadway, starring as Anna in the musical, Spring Awakening. For her performance as Ado Annie Carnes in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, Oklahoma!, Stroker became the first wheelchair user to win a Tony Award in 2019.
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