Policy Press

Disability and Ageing

Towards a Critical Perspective

By Ann Leahy

Published

Jan 10, 2023

Page count

240 pages

Browse the series

Ageing in a Global Context

ISBN

978-1447357162

Dimensions

234 x 156 mm

Imprint

Policy Press

Published

Jul 12, 2021

Page count

240 pages

Browse the series

Ageing in a Global Context

ISBN

978-1447357155

Dimensions

234 x 156 mm

Imprint

Policy Press

Published

Jul 12, 2021

Page count

240 pages

Browse the series

Ageing in a Global Context

ISBN

978-1447357179

Dimensions

234 x 156 mm

Imprint

Policy Press

Published

Jul 12, 2021

Page count

240 pages

Browse the series

Ageing in a Global Context

ISBN

978-1447357179

Dimensions

234 x 156 mm

Imprint

Policy Press
Disability and Ageing

In the media: 

Disability and ageing – time to think outside our silos? in Centre for Ageing Better 

Establishing a critical and interdisciplinary dialogue, this text engages with the typically disparate fields of social gerontology and disability studies. It investigates the subjective experiences of two groups rarely considered together in research – people ageing with long-standing disability and people first experiencing disability with ageing.

This book challenges assumptions about impairment in later life and the residual nature of the ‘fourth age’. It proposes that the experience of ‘disability’ in older age reaches beyond the bodily context and can involve not only a challenge to a sense of value and meaning in life, but also ongoing efforts in response.

"This is a wonderfully exciting study of the ageing/disability intersection: we have been waiting for a book like this in disability studies for a long time." Tom Shakespeare, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Ann Leahy is a postdoctoral researcher at the ERC-funded DANCING Project at Maynooth University’s Department of Law and the ALL Institute. She was previously Assistant CEO of Age & Opportunity, a non-governmental organisation in Ireland.

1. Introduction

Part 1: The context for disablement in older age

2. Defining disability

3. Literature: ageing, disability and lifecourse

4. Public policies on ageing and disability

Part 2: Empirical findings

5. Disabling bodies

6. Disabling or enabling contexts

7. Responding to challenges

8. Comparison: disability with ageing and ageing with disability

9. Conclusion

Methodological annexe