Introduction: Being Heumann

[Pierce]

This month's group read is Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Activist by Judith Heumann, with Kristen Joiner.

A story of fighting to belong in a world that wasn’t built for all of us and of one woman’s activism—from the streets of Brooklyn and San Francisco to inside the halls of Washington—Being Heumann, cowritten with Kristen Joiner, recounts Judy Heumann’s lifelong battle to achieve respect, acceptance, and inclusion in society.

Long before she became an internationally recognized leader of the Disability Rights movement, Heumann, who has used a wheelchair since she contracted polio as a young child, was a leader of the Section 504 protest. She details how protestors made it through the longest nonviolent sit-in at a federal building in US history. With the story of her life and activism, Heumann sheds light on the long-overlooked history of the Disability Rights Movement in the United States, and how activists worked together to change public perception of people with disabilities and fight for their civil rights.

Being Heumann is available at inSpirit: The UU Book and Gift Shop