"Honoring Marta Russell (1951 - 2013)" Ravi Malhotra 'Solidarity' April 2014
Russell grew up in the Mississippi Delta, born into an old Southern family. She was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy as an infant. During her childhood, she underwent numerous surgeries attempting to improve her mobility. The surgeries were without positive results. As a young adult, Marta attended the Memphis College of Art and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. She moved to Los Angeles, California, in her early 20s to pursue a career in film. She attended The American Film Institute (AFI) and worked as a graphic Artist, cinematic visual effects Artist, and a commercial Producer. A notable visual effects role was as Background Composite Supervisor for the film "Tron" (1982), working in parallel with her then-husband.
Marta's identity as a Writer and Journalist emerged as her disability progressed and she had to navigate the disability policy netherworld to survive. She became more involved with disability rights groups such as ADAPT. A Photographer as well as a Producer of audio and visual content, Russell was recognized in 1994 with an award from the City of Los Angeles Commission on Disabilities for her contributions to disability society in the media. Russell was co-producer/correspondent for the KCET Life & Times documentary entitled, "Disabled & the Cost of Saying 'I Do", which was honored with a prestigious Golden Mike Award for Journalism (1995).
"Dollars and Death," originally published in The Los Angeles Daily News,Sunday April 25, 1999 http://disweb.org/issues/pas/marta1.html
"Disablement, Prison, and Historical Segregation," co-written with Jean Stewart Monthly Review July–August 2001, Volume 53, Number 3 http://monthlyreview.org/2001/07/01/disablement-prison-and-historical-segregation
"Is the ADA Enough?" Interview fellow disability Activist Laura Hershey, originally published Colorado Quarterly Magazine, 2002 http://dljmlight.tripod.com/DL/IsADAenough.htm
"The Medicaid Kill-Off" MR Zine August 15, 2005 http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2005/russell150805.html
"Disablement, Oppression, and the Political Economy" Journal of Disability Policy Studies Fall 2001 vol. 12 no. 2 pp. 87–95 http://dps.sagepub.com/content/12/2/87.short
In October 2016, a Second Edition of "Beyond Ramps: Disability at the End of the Social Contract" was released in Amazon Kindle format. The second edition features a new foreword by the Routledge anthology's Editor, Ravi Malhotra.
In 2018, Haymarket Books will announce a new book project featuring Marta’s work.
