I’m excited to say that I’m working on a new article about creating assistive devices. In it I’m channeling all of my frustration with people unthinkingly acting as if assistive devices need to carry the entire weight of creating accessibility for disabled people and I’m really happy with how it is coming out. I’m also presenting my personal method for creating assistive devices. Here I’m sharing everything I’ve completed so far, followed by the outline of the remaining sections. As I finish new sections, I will update this post. I hope you enjoy what I’ve completed so far!
A dark skinned wheelchair user with long hair and a beanie sits at a small table, using their laptop to participate in a video meeting. The laptop screen is shown to their right, with the call being live captioned. The main speaker is a dark skinned person wearing a hijab and glasses, and three other participants are at the bottom of the screen, in smaller windows. In the bottom right corner, a yellow service dog bounds towards the wheelchair user. Illustration by Dana Chan for Disabled And Here.
Crafting Assistive Devices for Speculative Fiction
Respectfully portraying assistive devices in non-speculative fiction requires research and consulting, but it is a straight forward process. How do we do this in speculative fiction, when magic, advanced technology, or alternate worlds are involved?
What Are Assistive Devices?
Before we do anything else, I want to be clear what assistive technology and assistive devices are, because the mainstream view of disability portrays them in a narrow, distorted way. Surprisingly, there is significant variation in the definition of these terms, so I’m using the ones I find to be the most helpful.
- Assistive technology is any item, system, or product that a disabled person can use to increase their functional capabilities. This includes things that are specifically designed for disabled people and things that aren’t, such as magnifiers, speech recognition software, railings, and elevators.
Assistive technology and assistive devices are often used interchangeably. Technically, any assistive technology that is a device (a physical object made for a specific purpose) is an assistive device, making assistive device a narrower term because it leaves out things like computer programs. Although I recognize this difference, this article uses the term assistive device instead of assistive technology because it is more easily recognized. Not many people associate low tech devices, like grips and grab bars, with the word technology.
One more important definition is that of adaptive equipment.
- Adaptive equipment is a subcategory of assistive technology that only includes equipment specifically designed for people with disabilities, such as prosthetic limbs, power chairs, and Braille books.
The reason these definitions matter is that the mainstream view of disability leads people to confuse adaptive equipment with assistive devices and think of them both in limited ways. However the reality of assistive devices in the lives of disabled people is much broader, and showing that is part of portraying disability respectfully.
Start with the Big Picture
Now that we have a clearer idea of what assistive devices are, the next thing to know about assistive devices is that they don’t exist in isolation—they are part of a broader set of accessibility tools that come together to create access and inclusion for disabled people. Key accessibility tools to think about are: accessible physical environments, inclusive social structures, accommodations, assistance animals, assistance work, and medical care. Continue Reading »
Tags: access, accessibility, accessible physical environments, accommodations, Adaptive Equipment, assistive devices, Assistive Technology, disability, disabled, inclusion, inclusive social structures, speculative fiction, storytelling, ttrpg, writing advice
