Privileges and Prejudices: Intersectionality and Disability Accommodation

The intersection of disability and other aspects of identity as it relates to disability accommodation and labour market outcomes is an understudied area. It is difficult to fully assess the degree of intersectional employment discrimination and disadvantage that currently occurs. This lack of statistical data is largely due to process and policy related limitations with the court system and Human Rights Tribunals themselves. That said, there is still significant empirical evidence for such effects in academic literature. This chapter reviews both the legal and policy barriers and the academic literature, concluding that intersectional aspects of identity seem to impact the experiences of workers with disabilities in three ways. There is evidence of conventional stereotyping associated with the other aspects of their identity, gender role congruence effects, and negative responses by members of the dominant culture to perceived economic threat. These results suggest that to achieve better equity changes in the handling of disability, discrimination claims are required at the employer level but also at the level of government policy and within the courts.