Expanding your interests: Disability, race and gender in Sri Lanka

One reason it is important and useful to understand intersections between disability and other identities is because there are groups of people with disabilities who are more likely to experience disadvantage, oppression and violence.

Women with disabilities are one such group.

In this video, Dinesha Samararatne from the University of Colombo in Sri Lanka describes the Sri Lankan armed conflict of 1983-2009, and the experiences of women with disabilities living in war-affected areas.

Talking points

Throughout the video, Dinesha raises other identity categories that have an impact on the experience of disability in Sri Lanka. These included: religion, caste and rurality in addition to the others that we have explored around gender, race and ethnicity.

• Does anything surprise you about Dinesha’s description of disability intersectionalities?
• Reflecting upon your own local community, what are some of the identities that may intersect with disability and how it is experienced?

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