About Disability World
DisabilityWorld is a unique international online magazine (e-zine), dedicated to advancing an exchange of information and expertise about the international independent living movement of people with disabilities. Published by the World Institute on Disability (WID) since 2000 and available only online, DisabilityWorld features a wide variety of news reports, international studies and research, new projects, interviews, book and film reviews. Since 2005, DisabilityWorld has had a focus on initiatives and activities to improve the status of the estimated 400 million children, youth and adults with disabilities living in poor countries. DisabilityWorld has over 30,000 regular readers from 200 countries and received an Ashoka Changemakers Award in 2002. The most recent issues of DisabilityWorld are sponsored by WID, and WID is currently seeking funds to resume publishing DisabilityWorld on a more regular basis.
Please refer to our Publication Policies for information about submitting articles and reports to DisabilityWorld.
History and Background
Originally funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research as the cornerstone of the IDEAS for the New Millennium Project (1999-2005), DisabilityWorld was managed by the World Institute on Disability (WID), based in Oakland, California, and conducted as a collaborative effort with the participation of three other U.S.-based disability groups: The Independent Living Research Utilization Project (ILRU) of TIRR (The Institute for Rehabilitation and Research), based in Houston, Texas; The Inter-American Institute on Disability (IID), based in Washington, D.C.; and Rehabilitation International (RI), based in New York, New York.
DisabilityWorld covered seven key content areas from 2000-2005: independent living; employment; arts & media; technology & accessibility; governance & legislation; women; and children & youth. Each year, DisabilityWorld focused on 10 countries, in addition to the U.S, using in-country reporters with the goal of developing a portrait of the status of people with disabilities in each of the countries targeted for coverage. The first 23 issues were published in both English and Spanish, and IID served as the editor for the Spanish editions.
The IDEAS Project also hosted a series of experts’ meetings on key topics of interest to the disability community worldwide. The first in the series was on independent living, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 2000; the second, on Employment in Houston, Texas in 2001; the third, on Mass Media and Disability in Moscow, Russia in 2002, including the first international disability film festival ever held in Russia; and most recently, on Governance in Durban, South Africa in 2003 with a follow-up session in Oslo, Norway in 2004. WID also covered two international experts’ meetings on access and technology, one in Brussels in October 2004 and the second in Rio de Janeiro in December 2004. In addition to coverage in DisabilityWorld, WID and its partners produced final reports on each of the five topics, all available via WID’s website (http://www.wid.org/publications/).
DisabilityWorld also houses a literature database of more than 800 abstracts of articles primarily covering employment, independent living, governance, disabled women, disabled children, technology and appropriate technology, community based rehabilitation and rehabilitation in developing countries, all searchable by topic or country. However, due to limited resources, no new abstracts have been added since 2004.
Accessibility Policy
The staff of DisabilityWorld, which includes both blind and sighted members, value web accessibility. DisabilityWorld is accessible to graphical web browsers, text-based browsers such as lynx, and screen readers. The site meets W3C WCAG - A and Section 508 guidelines.
Terminology Policy
Terminology used in DisabilityWorld respects the plurality of identities of people with disabilities and associated social change movements around the globe. For example, we use the terms "disabled people" and "people with disabilities" interchangeably in recognition that both are in wide use internationally. We do edit when the concept of personhood is left out, such as "the disabled." The same breadth of diversity of acceptable terminology was applied to our parallel Spanish issues.
This is a scent-free website.
DisabilityWorld Personnel
Barbara Duncan, Editor Emeritus
Steven Kurzman, Webmaster
Jennifer Geagan, Manager
Report accessibility or site problems to the Manager (disabilityworld@wid.org).
Privacy Policy
DisabilityWorld collects aggregate data on visits to the site in order to better understand how successfully we are reaching our audience and to document the need for international disability resources on the web. The bulletin board uses "cookies" to store registered users' passwords, but not for tracking purposes.
DisabilityWorld will never give, sell, or trade email addresses collected by subscribing to the press releases or by including it in the feedback form to anyone nor will we send you spam, or unwanted email.
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