2026/06/01 by Jacqueline Kowalski, Tabea Bork‐Hüffer · 2 voices
Medicine · Social Sciences · #Disability Rights and Representation #Down syndrome and intellectual disability research #Geographies of human-animal interactions
paper · doi:10.1111/geoj.70100
openalex publication_date 2026/06/01 · openalex created_date 2026/06/04 · openalex updated_date 2026/06/04
ABSTRACT 101 million people in the EU live with disabilities (EU 2022). Yet, disabled voices rarely are considered in endeavours of futuring. Even more, amid rising socio‐political polarisation—fuelled by the knowledge crisis, populism and identity‐based divides—ableist norms are being reinforced, further marginalising and erasing disabled perspectives from public futures (Kafer 2013). To counter this trend, we must urgently begin ‘imagining otherwise’ (Olufemi 2021) and co‐envision desired futures through disabled perspectives. This commentary draws on Crip Theory, Critical Disability, and Black, Feminist and Queer Studies to advocate for co‐productive approaches to futuring that centre the knowledge, creativity and lived experiences of disabled people (Shrodes 2023). We propose developing ‘public geographies of futuring’ by invoking and unfolding disabled dreams. We argue that imagining futures together can make them actionable. Although futuring alone may not achieve structural change, ‘unfolding dreams’ can amplify underrepresented voices, increase public visibility and help initiate local transformations.