FYP Update: Disability Advocates

by Karah Chappel, MT-BC

What does your Instagram “For You Page” look like? Fitness influencers, cooking videos, makeup tutorials, celebrity gossip? I would happily fall down any of those rabbit holes. I also like having content that provokes me to think – like so many of the folks I’m going to show you today. As we are firmly landed in Disability Pride month, it’s time to take a look at some of our favorite disability advocates and influencers.

For music therapy clinicians, we know how important it is to stay up to date on evidence-based practice. But what do we do when the research base isn’t enough? Or what if we’re not clinicians and want to support the disabled community better? We turn to the advocates! Advocates are individuals from within a given community who are experts on the community and on their own lived experiences, using all of that to educate those outside the community on best practices. Advocates are often faster at getting current information out than the track of classic academia. This includes preferred language, symptoms, lived experiences, treatments, or support options. Most notably, advocates carry the importance of lived experience – a true knowledge of how a diagnosis presents and affects their life – that researchers often lack.

Check out some of the advocates Heart and Harmony is following for your own fyp update. Or, hop back to our blog on Autism and music therapy for more recommendations.

Onto the Advocates!

Autistic Self Advocacy Network “seeks to advance the principles of the disability rights movement with regard to autism,” per their Instagram bio. Follow them for resources on Autism self-advocacy and up to date information on current issues faced by the Autistic community.

Disability Reframed is a page run by Ashley Harris Whaley, an author, speaker, educator, and disability advocate. The initiative shares Ashley’s story through text, videos, poems, and pictures, often opening a space for discussion in the comments.

SAGE Studio & Gallery, “Supporting Artistic Growth and Entrepreneurship” provides both studio and exhibition space to artists with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Follow to see the art and artists – or swing by Austin, Texas to see it in person!

Emily Ladau is a disability advocate, author, and podcast co-host, centering around her experiences as a disabled person and powerchair user. Visit her page for fiery honest commentary on disability rights.

NADIA runs a stunning page on her experiences as a black late-diagnosed Autistic woman. Check out her beautifully crafted posts for lived experiences of her diagnosis; or, for her “Productivity Guide for Neurodivergents,” available for free through her link tree.

Rebekah Taussig curates a page with the same name as her book: “Sitting Pretty.” Her personal blog features pictures of her life accompanied by captions that could be called essays with insight to her experiences with disability and motherhood.

Alice Wong, author and advocate, has pieces across a variety of outlets including two books and many magazine articles in places like Teen Vogue and Time. Speaking honestly about her life with muscular dystrophy, Alice meets the intersection of social justice and disability justice.

Sins Invalid is a “queer, POC-led disability justice performance project.” Add them to your feed for thought provoking art and information on workshops that address a variety of disability justice topics.

Now this is by no means a full list. There are so many additional creators out there with unique voices that need to be heard for a true push forward with the disability justice movement.

We hope you’ll give some of them a follow – and if you do, let us know in the comments.