This course will explore the complex relationships between disability and the law. In the first few sessions, the course will explore the ways in which law, society and people with disabilities define "disability." Who is disabled? Is disability the basis of identity like race, gender, or sexual orientation? Are the disabled a coherent social or political group, or is there too much variance within this group. The course will then look at how different areas of law impact the lives of people with disabilities. The course will survey relevant cases, statutes, articles, and legal doctrines and explore how this area of law reflects societal expectations of people, both with and without disabilities. A primary focus of the course will be on laws relating to disability and income. To what extent does the law define disability in terms of the ability to work? If the norm in the United States is that people are to "earn a living" through work, to what extent do public benefit programs for the disabled exempt certain people from that norm? how do these benefit programs relate to anti-discrimination laws, such as Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of disability? The course will take a similar approach to laws regulating education, access to services and medical care, and the private lives of people with disabilities. For example, what is the state's obligation in educating people with disabilities? How effectively is that obligation carried out? Can a health care provider deny a disabled woman an organ transplant based on the fact that her disability impacts the quality or length of her life? How do laws regulate the right of the disabled to have sexual relationships, to marry, and to procreate? What are the legal and ethical issues surrounding the genetic testing of fetuses for potential disabilities, or the attempts of a deaf couple to deliberately have a deaf baby? The course will examine these and other areas of disability law. The course requirements will include the option of a research paper or a take-home exam.