About this episode

Angela Frederick discusses the impact of the 2021 Texas power crisis on individuals with disabilities and the systemic issues that exacerbate their vulnerability during disasters.

A call to place disability at the center of climate and disaster responsesEvery disaster is a disability disaster, argues Angela Frederick. Disabled Power: A Storm, A Grid, and Embodied Harm in the Age of Disaster (NYU Press, 2025) tells the stories of Texans with disabilities who endured the 2021 Texas power crisis, which forced millions of Texas residents to endure a dayslong winter storm without heat or water. Based on 58 in-depth interviews with disabled Texans and parents of disabled children, Frederick highlights how disabled people and those with chronic health conditions are uniquely harmed when basic infrastructure such as power and water systems fail. She argues that the vulnerability people with disabilities experienced during this disaster was not an inevitable consequence of individual disabled bodies. Rather, disability vulnerability was “produced” by policies that “disabled” vital infrastructure.Frederick also emphasizes another meaning of the phrase “disabled power:” the individual and collective resilience and creativity Texans with disabilities exercised to survive the disaster. Despite common perceptions of people with disabilities as passive…

People in this episode

Guest: Angela Frederick

Topics covered

• disability
• climate change
• disaster response
• infrastructure
• resilience
• vulnerability

Keywords

• disability
• climate disaster
• Texas power crisis
• infrastructure failure
• resilience
• chronic health conditions
• community care

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: NYU Press

Books & works: Disabled Power: A Storm, A Grid, and Embodied Harm in the Age of Disaster

Places: Texas

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