American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults
Future Reflections Winter 2022 REVIEW
by Arielle Silverman
Reviewed by Kristen Witucki
From the Editor: Kristin Witucki is the author of two novels for young adults, The Transcriber and Outside Myself. She lives in New Jersey, where she is a teacher of blind and visually-impaired students.
Just Human: The Quest for Disability Wisdom, Respect, and Inclusion
by Arielle Silverman
Available in electronic formats from disabilitywisdom.org/just-human-book
Available in hardcopy Braille from the author at [email protected]
Available from amazon.com in paperback and Kindle editions
Just Human is a beautifully crafted memoir that weaves stories from Arielle Silverman's life with relevant sociological and psychological scholarly wisdom about disability, marginalization, and inclusion. It is divided into eighteen chapters, which, as Silverman explains, "is symbolically linked to the Hebrew word chai, meaning ‘life’ or ‘living.’”
The first fourteen chapters center upon stories from Silverman's life and work, which she adeptly connects to broader experiences and findings from disability history or scholarly calls to action for social justice for all, but especially for disabled people. We learn about Silverman's early childhood, her gradual awakening to society's low expectations of blind students, her education, her relationships and marriage, and the ways in which she has given to the disability community as an adult. While Silverman clearly demonstrates that she has succeeded as a scholar, researcher, and mentor, she does not shy away from some of the negative experiences that helped her get there. As she awakens to social attitudes about disability, her humor, anger, wit, and determination show, making this a highly relatable book for disabled teens and adults and their allies.
As a fellow white blind writer in somewhat similar educational circumstances, I experienced moments of recognition as I read Silverman's childhood stories. Throughout my life, I've grappled with my own white privilege, even as I chafe against a society in which perpetually low expectations of blind people are often the norm. Like Silverman, I awakened to societal stigmas about disability during late elementary school. Like her, during middle school, I even met my first teacher who openly admitted that, if I hadn't done the work, I probably still would have gotten a good grade in the class—the B for Blind admission that can make an adolescent think, "Why bother? My job is not to inspire you." In short, while Silverman's stories were obviously individual and unique, I found the similarities with my own experiences so striking at times that the book was a homecoming.
The next three chapters of Just Human turn outward. Silverman's stories are no longer at the center; instead, she shifts to a more theoretical and equally engaging framework. She ruminates on the importance of listening to and validating students' concerns, a critical examination of the traditional views of "stimming" behaviors in the disability community, and her five stages of inclusion. These chapters build toward greater enlightenment and ultimately lead to an understanding of disability as a social construct and a shared experience toward which we all can hold responsibility as emancipators.
Silverman's eighteenth chapter brings the book to a close. It implies that more books and more great work will come from the mind and heart of this important blind researcher, educator, and author. Silverman's worries about "special" education as a distinct, sometimes problematic discipline in which learning can be more regimented, especially resonated with me as a teacher. Her views about the limitations for disabled people in the world of work are equally astute. "Recently, a disabled friend asked me if I thought every disabled person could work," she writes. "I said yes, in the ideal world, every human being can make a contribution to the public good. Can everyone put in a forty-hour workweek? No. Can everyone do work that is currently valued at a living wage? No, but that doesn't mean everyone cannot do something of value. Is everyone matched to the job that makes optimal use of their abilities and minimizes the impact of their impairments? That would be another emphatic no."
Just Human, as its title suggests, is not an inspirational story, though many elements of Silverman's thoughts and lived experiences do inspire. The book does not pit blindness against success or isolate the individual from their blind or Jewish communities. Though I don't know her personally, Arielle Silverman is a familiar, positive presence in the blindness community and beyond it. I presume that she has written her book much as she has lived her life, as a person who has found her own way. She acknowledges the privileges and the struggles of those who came before her who helped her to get where she is today. Her book concludes: "I don't know what will happen during my next two, perhaps even three or four more chais before it is time for my earthly existence to end. I try to have faith that, in the words of my favorite childhood superhero Martin Luther King, Jr., "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. Of course, the arc does not bend on its own. It is up to all of us to invest the labor of working toward the changes we wish to see. As I enter my third chai, my third generation of living, I hope all of you will remain invested with me."
Silverman's book leaves me feeling invested in my own work, and I can't wait to read what she thinks of next!