ABSTRACT
Geographers have made increasingly sophisticated contributions to understanding the lives of disabled people and people with chronic illnesses and the socio-spatial forces shaping those lives. This chapter discusses the emergence and development of research into the socio-spatial lives of disabled people and people managing chronic illness as a sub-disciplinary field–a field informed by both critical social geography and health geography. It outlines key contributions to geographies of disability and chronic illness, defined by the US National Center for Health Statistics as an illness "lasting 3 months or more". Geographic research has helped make processes of disablement, disempowerment and marginalization among those with impairments and/or chronic illnesses more central concerns in health geography. The chapter presents a consideration of major criticisms of research on geographies of disability and chronic illness. It concludes with reflections on the future development of this vitally important area of inquiry.
