Elizabeth DePoy

Who is Elizabeth DePoy?

Elizabeth DePoy is a theorist, researcher who is best known for her work in methods of inquiry, legitimacy theory, &, and disjunture theory. Co-authored with Stephen Gilson, DePoy developed Explanatory Legitimacy Theory. Through that lens, DePoy analyzes how population group membership is assigned, is based on political purpose, and is met with formal responses that serve both intentionally and unintentionally to perpetuate segregation, economic status quo, and inter-group tension. Co-authored with Gilson, Disjuncture Theory explains disability as an interactive “ill-fit” between bodies and environments.

DePoy's life experience synthesized with breadth and depth of interdisciplinary thought has created an important theoretical advancements in disability, diversity and humanness studies. This frame of reference has served as the basis for her work and has been acknowledged as a new paradigm for disability studies by many scholars in the field ⁽⁴⁾ and disjuncture theory.

Her research in disability studies and the advancement of disability as diversity, through which she applies the lens of Explanatory Legitimacy Theory and Disjuncture Theory has been supported from federal and foundation sources in excess of eight million dollars. Most recently, DePoy has expanded her work to examine how impaired bodies illuminate values that challenge the boundaries of humanness. Along with her co-author, Gilson, she has suggested that embodied impairment can be thought of as a violation of humanness, begetting responses of revision, reinvention or denial.