Simi Linton, author of Claiming Disability: Knowledge and Identity, a widely used text in disability and cultural studies, and of the memoir My Body Politic, delivered the third annual Meredith E. Drench lecture. Sponsored by the College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences: Sargent College, the lecture series focuses on the psychosocial aspects of rehabilitation.

Linton is president of Disability/Arts, an organization that works with artists and cultural institutions to help shape the presentation of disability in the arts and to increase the representation of works by disabled artists. Linton served on the faculty of the City University of New York from 1984 through 1998, and was co-director of Columbia University's seminar in disability studies from 2003 through 2007. She is currently working on a documentary film, Invitation to Dance, about her life as a disabled woman.

A behavioral specialist and Sargent College graduate, Meredith E. Drench in 2009 established the Meredith E. Drench Lectureship Fund, Sargent College's first endowed lecture series, to share her passion and belief in "compassionate rehabilitation" of the whole person.

Hosted by Sargent College on April 12, 2011.