This book provides a sound overview of the field of disabilities studies by integrating a review of the three major variations of disabilities: physical disabilities, cognitive disabilities and mental retardation. Author Duane Stroman reveals the evolving goals, key organizational actors, and many accomplishments of the disability rights movement. Stroman brings together, under one cover, the changing definitions of disability, the origins of deinstitutionalization of those with mental and physical disabilities and the current direction of the ever changing disability rights movement.