Pamela Block · Canada and the United States
Research in North America
In Canada and the United States, Pam’s research follows disabled people and their families across a lifetime — from parent activism and sibling care to health promotion, complex medical needs, and the policies that shape everyday support.
Overview
Before joining Western University in 2019, Pam spent nearly two decades at Stony Brook University, where she directed the disability studies program in the Health and Rehabilitation Sciences PhD, and earlier worked at Brown University and the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Much of her North American work is participatory: it is built with disabled people, families, and community organizations rather than only about them.
Themes
Family and disability activism
How parents, siblings, and disabled activists organize — the subject of Allies and Obstacles and Family and Disability Activism.
Sibling care
What happens as disabled people increasingly outlive their parents, and siblings take on care within a strained support system.
Complex medical needs
Young people who rely on ventilators and 24-hour care as they age out of children’s hospitals and pediatric services.
Race, poverty, and disability
How racism and poverty compound disability oppression, and what capacity building looks like in minority communities.
Projects
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2022–2025
Care Relationships of Adult Disabled and Nondisabled Siblings
Principal Investigator
A SSHRC Partnership Engage project with the Azrieli Foundation Centre for Caregiving Excellence. Its findings appear in Medical Anthropology Quarterly (2025) and in op-eds in the Toronto Star and Montreal Gazette (2026).
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2025–2026
Planning and Facilitation
Principal Investigator, with Partners for Planning
Expanding the capacity of person-centred planning and facilitation supports for disabled people and families across Canada.
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2021–2023
Beyond Allies and Obstacles
Co-Director, Ford Foundation
The project behind Family and Disability Activism, centering BIPOC and LGBTQIA2S+ disabled activists and families.
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2002–2005
Shake It Up!
Principal Investigator
Health promotion and capacity building with people with spinal cord injuries and related neuromuscular disabilities, funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research.
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2006–2010
Pediatric Multiple Sclerosis community building
Principal Investigator and Rehabilitation Liaison
Retreats, research, and community for teens with MS, with the National Multiple Sclerosis Society’s Pediatric MS Center of Excellence.
Selected publications
- Extraordinary Measures of Sibling Care Relationships (external site)with H. Ries and D. Kassem · Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 2025
- Aging Out of Children’s HospitalsFamily and Disability Activism, Temple University Press, 2025
- Social and health experiences of disabled people with complex medical conditions during the COVID-19 pandemicwith J. M. Lorandi · Research in Social Science and Disability 13, 2023
- Allies and Obstacles: Disability Activism and Parents of Children with Disabilitieswith A. C. Carey and R. K. Scotch · Temple University Press, 2020
- Sometimes Allies: Parent-Led Disability Organizations and Social Movements (external site)with A. C. Carey and R. K. Scotch · Disability Studies Quarterly 39(1), 2019
- Project Shake-It-Up!: A Disability Studies Framework of Empowerment for Capacity Building and Health Promotionwith E. Vanner, C. B. Keys, J. Rimmer, and S. Skeels · Disability & Rehabilitation, 2010
- From Pathology to Power: Rethinking Race, Poverty and Disabilitywith F. Balcazar and C. Keys · Journal of Disability Policy Studies, 2001
In the news
- Siblings are holding up a broken disability systemMontreal Gazette, April 2026 (with H. Ries)
- A multistate lawsuit threatens disabled rightsThe Hill, May 2026 (with A. C. Carey and R. K. Scotch)
- As disabled people increasingly outlive their parents, many siblings struggle to take on new care responsibilitiesToronto Star, January 2026 (with H. Ries and D. Kassem)