Disability Studies
Ryan Parrey, Program Director
233 Senior Hall
312.622.0195
program web page
Disability Studies explores disability as a function of sociocultural theories and practices that privilege particular bodies over others, challenging the view of disability as an individual deficit that can be remedied through medical intervention or rehabilitation. Aligning itself with the disability rights and other social justice movements, Disability Studies promotes access, inclusion, and equity for all.
Eastern Washington University’s Disability Studies (DSST) program offers an undergraduate certificate and minor in Disability Studies as well as a graduate certificate. Classes are available online as well as on campus. The DSST certificates and minor are ideal for students in the social sciences, humanities, and human services.
Degrees
Minor–Disability Studies
Certificate–Disability Studies
Graduate Certificate–Disability Studies
Required courses in these programs of study may have prerequisites. Reference the course description section for clarification.
Undergraduate Program
Disability Studies is an interdisciplinary academic program involving multiple academic departments throughout the university. Administratively, it is located in the College of Professional Programs, School of Social Work, drawing students from multiple disciplines from every EWU college. It is offered in both traditional and online educational formats.
Disability Studies is a multidisciplinary field drawing from humanities and liberal arts, and from the social, physical, and natural sciences. Taught by faculty from multiple fields and disciplines, the Disability Studies program offers courses at both the undergraduate and graduate levels and educates students to develop an understanding of disability, disability culture, and people with disabilities as diverse and inclusive members of society.
The Disability Studies Certificate and Minor embrace disability as part of the tapestry of a diverse society. It highlights universal access the philosophy that responsible societies do not just accommodate minorities but are constructed for all people; majority and minority, typical and atypical. It acknowledges people’s intersectionalities; that we each have multiple traits and characteristics. It utilizes critical diversity theory; that our diverse traits occur in social contexts, and opportunities are influenced by societal structures and policies. The program’s emphasis on diversity, social justice, and universal access complements the university’s mission to prepare its graduates to live and work in a diverse society, including disability advocacy and human rights work.
The online DSST program is tailored to people who work in disability advocacy, independent living, or human diversity fields who live throughout the US and internationally.
Graduate Program
The Disability Studies Graduate Certificate program embraces disability as part of the tapestry of a diverse society. It highlights universal access the philosophy that responsible societies do not just accommodate minorities but are constructed for all people; majority and minority, typical and atypical. It acknowledges people’s intersectionalities; that we each have multiple traits and characteristics. It utilizes critical diversity theory; that our diverse traits occur in social contexts, and opportunities are influenced by societal structures and policies. The program’s emphases on diversity, social justice, and universal access complement the university’s mission to prepare its graduates to live and work in a diverse society, including disability advocacy and human rights work.
The Disability Studies Graduate Certificate program is offered in traditional and online formats and is designed for students living throughout the US and internationally. Matriculated graduate students are invited to enroll in Disability Studies courses. Post baccalaureate, non-matriculated students are required to follow university procedures to enroll in the Certificate Program.
Disability Studies Courses
DSST 130. BODIES, MINDS AND MOVIES. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: sophomore standing.
Satisfies: a BACR for Humanities and Arts.
Representations of disabled people in literature, art, film, music and theatre reflect and shape what disability means and what it means to be disabled. In addition to exploring mainstream representations, we examine works that demonstrate artistic, scholarly and concrete ways of doing disability differently. We critically assess intersectionalities and the disabling and "othering" of diversities including gender and ethnicity.
DSST 205. DISABILITY AND PSYCHOLOGY. 5 Credits.
Cross-listed: PSYC 205.
Satisfies: a BACR for social sciences.
Students explore the lived social and psychological experience of disabled individuals from a disability studies perspective that “disability” is a socially construct rather than an individual-deficiency. Students examine strengths and limitations of traditional psychology and disability studies bases scholarship and approaches. They engage in psychological enquiry into how disabled people can forge positive identities and how disabled people collectively build disability culture and community.
DSST 215. BIOSOCIAL ASPECTS OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT. 5 Credits.
This course focuses on the biosocial domain and covers biological systems, development and functioning and the social contextual meanings of biological traits and conditions, (e.g. neurological, hereditary, sexual, immune, sensory) and characteristics and impairments (e.g. physical traits and characteristics, mental and cognitive functioning). Implications of impairment, disability and Disability are analyzed and compared to other characteristics and traits that are used to marginalize people.
DSST 225. DISABILITY HISTORY IN THE UNITED STATES. 5 Credits.
Students examines patterns of understanding and responding to human difference in American history, emphasizing disability as a label and lived experience. The course provides a historical context for understanding and assessing contemporary issues facing disabled people. Additionally, it familiarizes students with methods for the retrieval and engages them critical examination of primary historical source material that influence how history is interpreted and understood.
DSST 266. GENDER, HEALTH AND MARGINALIZATION. 5 Credits.
Cross-listed: GWSS 266, ANTR 266.
Pre-requisites: ENGL 201 or equivalent.
Satisfies: a BACR for social sciences.
This interdisciplinary course explores personal, social, and political concerns regarding gender and health, including public health practice, epidemiological research, health policy, and access to health services. It includes discussion of health and reproductive justice activism.
DSST 310. DISABILITY, CULTURE AND SOCIETY. 5 Credits.
Notes: may be stacked with DSST 501.
Satisfies: a university graduation requirement–diversity.
Disability and persons with disabilities have been with us throughout the history of humankind. This course familiarizes students to disability as a component of the diverse tapestry of society. Historical disability conceptualizations and issues are discussed. Contemporary and emerging explanations of disability in contemporary society and Disability Culture are explored.
DSST 326. BODIES, SOCIALIZATION AND CULTURE. 5 Credits.
Cross-listed: CDST 326, GWSS 326.
Notes: CDST students only: CDST 300.
Pre-requisites: ENGL 201 or equivalent.
Satisfies: a university graduation requirement–diversity.
This course examines cultural beliefs about gender, sex, sexuality, and the body. Experiences throughout our lifetimes impact ways that we learn to embody gender, express sexuality, and live in our bodies. We use intersectional feminist approaches to consider the variety of lived, embodied experiences and social effects of categorizing bodies.
DSST 340. DOING DISABILITY STUDIES. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: DSST 310 or permission of instructor.
In this course, students apply Disability Studies principles to their occupations, careers, and everyday lives. Students apply previous learning about diversity, disability, and people with disabilities to employment and community contexts. They analyze professional, organizational, and community practices and policies to assess accessibility and inclusion of people with disabilities and other diverse groups as leaders, colleagues, consumers and clients.
DSST 360. RESEARCH METHODS IN DISABILITY STUDIES. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: MTHD 104 or equivalent.
This course teaches social research methods used in positivist and constructivist research. Students interpret research and assess uses, benefits, drawbacks and ethics of respective social research approaches. Students evaluate how research has been used to marginalize disabled people and other minority groups juxtaposed with emancipatory research. They learn processes to formulate concrete research questions and plans, review literature, collect and analyze data, and disseminate results.
DSST 410. DISABILITY AS DIVERSITY. 5 Credits.
Cross-listed: GWSS 418.
Notes: may be stacked with DSST 510.
Pre-requisites: junior standing or instructor permission required.
This course teaches students to recognize, analyze, and comprehend disability, and disabled persons, as part of the rich tapestry of human experience; including disability intersections with other diverse identities and groups in society. Working through interdisciplinary scholarship, cultural artifacts, and first-person accounts, students will learn how disability compliments and also complicate existing identity categories and notions of diversity.
DSST 420. HUMAN DIVERSITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS. 5 Credits.
Notes: may be stacked with DSST 520.
Pre-requisites: successful completion of a university diversity course or permission of the instructor.
Satisfies: a university graduation requirement–global studies.
This course explores how laws and policies affect diverse people and groups; majority and minority, domestically and globally. It goes beyond laws and policies affecting discrete groups based on their characteristics by addressing intersectionalities, analyzing beliefs and practices that transcend specific times, identities, and locations. It looks at how societies and contexts frame people’s individual characteristics and traits and develop policies and practices.
DSST 445. DISABILITY AND ETHICS. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: DSST 310 or instructor permission.
Based on Disability Studies scholarship, this course teaches students about disability related moral and ethical issues. It explores moral beliefs and ethical standards pertaining to matters such as quality of life, humanness, and end of life decisions. Students will explore the material consequences of these historical and contemporary matters as they work through real life situations in community, organizational, professional, and everyday settings.
DSST 490. SENIOR CAPSTONE PROJECT IN UNIVERSAL ACCESS. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: DSST 410 or permission of the instructor.
Satisfies: a university graduation requirement–senior capstone.
This course provides students the opportunity to develop a community-based, service-learning project with colleagues from multiple academic disciplines. Under the direction of the instructor, students participate in a project that addresses universal access in the context of a diverse society. Weekly lectures integrate conceptual and practical learning relative to universal access for diverse populations including those with disabilities.
DSST 495. INTERNSHIP. 1-5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: permission of the instructor, department chair and college dean.
Internship.
DSST 496. EXPERIMENTAL. 1-5 Credits.
DSST 497. WORKSHOP, SHORT COURSE, CONFERENCE, SEMINAR. 1-5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: DSST 310 or instructor permission.
This course allow the DSST program to provide students for-credit opportunities for engaging in seminars and short courses focusing on contemporary issues that are in line with the core values of the DSST program of universal access, intersectionality and critical diversity. Credits options are offered for students who engage in additional scholarly activity in addition to the sessions.
DSST 499. DIRECTED STUDY. 1-15 Credits.
Pre-requisites: permission of the instructor, department chair and college dean.
Independent study under faculty direction, adapted to individual needs of the students.
DSST 501. DISABILITY, CULTURE AND SOCIETY. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: baccalaureate degree or instructor permission.
Disability and persons with disabilities have been with us throughout the history of humankind. This course has been developed to familiarize students to disability as a component of the diverse tapestry of society. Historical disability conceptualizations and issues will be discussed. Contemporary and emerging explanations of disability in contemporary society and Disability Culture will be explored.
DSST 510. DISABILITY AS DIVERSITY. 5 Credits.
Notes: may be stacked with DSST 410.
Pre-requisites: baccalaureate degree or instructor permission.
Disability shapes, and is shaped by, multiple social and cultural identities as well as lived experiences. This course teaches students to recognize, analyze, and comprehend disability, and disabled persons, as part of the rich tapestry of human experience; including disability intersections with other diverse identities and groups in society. Working through interdisciplinary scholarship, cultural artifacts, and first-person accounts, students will learn how disability compliments and also complicates existing identity categories and notions of diversity.
DSST 520. HUMAN DIVERSITY AND HUMAN RIGHTS. 5 Credits.
Notes: may be stacked with DSST 420.
Pre-requisites: bachelor's degree or permission of the instructor.
In this course, students explore how laws and policies are formulated and applied across diversities; minority and majority, advantaged and disadvantaged. We investigate the explicit and implicit effects of laws and policies and how they enhance and inhibit human rights for people based on characteristics such as gender and gender identity, race and ethnicity, disability, religion, and economic status. Beginning with a foundation in U.S. laws and policies, students also explore international human diversity and human rights. We assess historical and contemporary approaches to human rights including mechanisms employed by leaders such as the founding leaders of the U.S., Mahatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Paul Kagame of Rwanda, and Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela of South Africa, and apply them to contemporary issues and events.
DSST 530. DISABILITY: CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES FROM THE LIBERAL ARTS AND HUMANITIES. 5 Credits.
Pre-requisites: bachelor's degree or permission or instructor.
This course addresses Disability Studies as it as unfolded within and across the humanities and liberal arts. Over the last generation, disability studies scholars have analyzed representations of people with disabilities as they appear in literature, myth, art, film, photography, music and theatre. These fields reflect and shape the meaning and reality of disability. Poetic and other artistic modes of discourse can deepen our understanding of the lived experience of disability.
DSST 590. INTERDISCIPLINARY PROJECT IN UNIVERSAL ACCESS. 5 Credits.
Notes: may be stacked with DSST 490.
Pre-requisites: DSST 510 or permission.
This course is applies classroom learning to community settings. Students in this course will participate in community engaged service learning with colleagues from multiple academic disciplines. Under the direction of the instructor and working with a community mentors, students will participate in projects that enrich the community by enhancing universal access and full participation in society by diverse groups.
DSST 596. EXPERIMENTAL COURSE. 1-6 Credits.
DSST 599. IND STUDY. 1-5 Credits.
Independent Study.