Roland Johnson's Lost in a Desert World: An Autobiography - Karl Williams

\nRoland Johnson's autobiography is the triumphant story of a man who rose above an intellectual disability and devastating abuse to become a prominent leader in the self-advocacy movement. \nAs a child, Roland was sent away to live at the infamous Pennhurst State School in Pennsylvania, where he was sexually assaulted and forced to do unpaid manual labor. When he finally got out, he discovered the real world had no place for people like him - people who weren't considered normal or valuable by societal standards. \nThrough a hospital counseling program, Roland ultimately began to find his voice. He discovered an ability to speak his truth and to fight for other people with disabilities. He would become president of Speaking for Ourselves and bring wide-scale awareness to the struggles faced by people with disabilities, as well as the unique gifts those same people have to offer. \nLost in a Desert World brings you into Roland's life through his own voice and both encourages and challenges you to connect to your own humanity as a means of connecting with the humanity present in all people. Roland Johnson was a man of great courage, vision, and determination. He had an alternate kind of intelligence - one not based on what we call intellect. In Roland Johnson's world, understanding - one person for another - is the way of the future, the only route to true freedom. \nCRITICAL PRAISE \nRoland Johnson has an important story to tell. In writing this truth-telling autobiography, he becomes a powerful witness to the cost of segregation and the hope of community. - Joseph P. Shapiro, author of No Pity: People with Disabilities Forging a New Civil Rights Movement \nRoland Johnson was a friend and a hero of mine. He was a great pioneer of the frontier of human being. Read his book. - Justin Dart, father of the ADA, Americans With Disabilities Act, and Chairperson of the President's Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities under President Bush \nRoland Johnson was a good and true man whose friendship I cherished. He was a teacher to many of us, and now this book will carry his voice across the country. - Gunnar Dybwad, internationally respected advocate and past president of the International League of Societies for Persons with Mental Handicaps \nRoland is a man who accepted you for who you were. He was a friend to everyone and wanted to help people live their dreams and have control over their lives. It was an honor to have him as my