Canadian QTBIPOC writer, performance artist, and disability justice activist Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha will open your mind and expand your understanding of living a adult-identified autistic life. This book will open you to a new way of being in the world and I invite you to step into it with your whole self.
“Care Work is a mapping of access as radical love, a celebration of the work that sick and disabled queer/people of color are doing to find each other and to build power and community, and a tool kit for everyone who wants to build radically resilient, sustainable communities of liberation where no one is left behind. Powerful and passionate, Care Work is a crucial and necessary call to arms.”
— from Amazon.com
Existing as we do, in a world that is often hostile in multiple ongoing ways, public and private, is an act of activism.
Good to know:
- 304 pages.
- Paperback, audiobook, and Amazon Kindle versions are available.
- Borrow at your local library.
Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha is a “queer, autistic and disabled nonbinary femme writer, disability and transformative justice movement worker, curator and educator of Burgher/Tamil Sri Lankan and Irish/Roma ascent. The author or co-editor of ten books, they are a 2020-2021 Disability Futures Fellow and a longtime performer with the disability justice collective Sins Invalid.”
Website: brownstargirl.org
tektite –
Excellent book, highly recommend for anyone interested in improving access, inclusion, and disability justice in our communities, networks, and activities. Powerful mix of personal stories, discussion & critique of disability justice in our communities, and practical points about what real access could or should look like. Femme QTBIPOC focused. This was written pre-covid, but it feels even more timely, great food for thought.
Symone –
I am an anthropology PhD student doing research on alternative approaches to healing practice and community building. I have been utilizing a healing justice framework primarily to ground my work and was only superficially knowledgeable about disability justice work and the particular kind of care work that Leah lays out in this text. This book has catapulted my work in many ways (providing nuanced definitions of access, care, ability, etc.) and was most successful at communicating why we must all have a vested interest in matters of disability justice as we work towards our collective liberation. I could go on, but I highly recommend this book to any and everyone, even (and perhaps especially) those who work outside of the social justice realm. It’s about time we all take disability justice seriously and more intentionally center these issues in our everyday discussions about justice and liberation.
Mary Ann Thomas –
Care Work is hands down one of the most important books I’ve read lately. It’s a history of the disability justice movement which talks about practical models for care that don’t rely on violent state or family structures. Piepzna-Samarasinha writes on healing justice and theorizes anti-ableist survivor healing. Each essay had so much gold and I plan on buying half a dozen copies to gift to those who need it. Personally, I found a language here about emotional labor that goes beyond gender binaries, that acknowledges they way femmes of color are the ones who are both willing to, and expected to, take care of everyone without adequate pay or acknowledgment.
Lucy Merriman –
Cathartic, practical healing book. As a sick / disabled person, I want to use Piepzna-Samarasinha’s framework for looking at disability, our need for care, and our unique skills and powers, and draw together the disabled + queer community here in Ohio. We are so segregated! So isolated from each other. It can be so much better and more beautiful. “Care Work” is part-dream, part-map, part challenge.
Emilio –
This is fantastic work that really articulates a lot of things I’ve struggled to find out how to say myself. It’s very validating for people who are disabled or exist in a less-than-abled space, where you’re not where health and ability actually leaves you. I think anyone looking for radical social change in any sector should pick this up and take a read.
Amazon Customer –
We have an Access and Diversity group and safe space at school where there are DVDs and books available for viewing and sharing. This was a great addition to the library. Thank you!
Kate Moran –
I just keep reading and re-reading it. One of the most amazing disability writers.
Sara McGee –
Care Work is a collection of essays discussing different forms of disability activism, especially care networks.This was my first successful audiobook read. I loved Piepzna-Samarasinha’s narration. The essay format and the narration style felt similar to a podcast, which I really enjoyed.I learned a lot from these essays. I learned about disability communities and care networks, and I learned about disability and ableism from the perspective of a QTBIPOC person.CW: ableism; suicide/suicidal thoughts; racism; sexism; homo/transphobia; sexual assault; domestic abuse
Daniel Podnar –
good
love this book
traylemario –
A Must Have
Fantastic!