When Ann Wai-Yee Kwong entered UC Berkeley as a student, she had never heard of disability studies, an interdisciplinary field that examines the social structures and cultural depictions that shape — and are shaped by — the experiences of people with disabilities.
“There's no chapter in high school that focuses on disability,” said Kwong, who is blind. “The idea that disability is something you can be proud of — that it’s a field with rich socioeconomic and historical identity you can study — was relatively new to me.”