Category Archives: Made Possible

Made Possible is a month old

It’s taken less than four weeks for the book I’m editing, Made Possible, to become more than 50% crowdfunded – and this is all down to the project’s incredible and growing band of supporters.

The anthology includes the experiences of people with learning disabilities in their own words – it challenges the current narratives on learning disability which dictate that people are pitied, patronised, and not heard from directly. It presents the authentic experiences of a range of professionals who have a learning disability; these high achievers tell their own personal stories of success.

As a social affairs journalist, most of my work over the last 20 years has been influenced by the fact that I have a learning disabled sister. I know that her learning disability doesn’t define her, but society inflexibly labels her in terms of her condition, instead of recognising her personality, skills and abilities.

Attitudes must change – and that’s why we need this book, which is already halfway to being published (click here to make a pledge to help publish the book and join its community of supporters).

To hit such a milestone so soon reflects a determination of so many people to shift negative attitudes towards learning disabled people.

Made Possible also considers the wider context that undermines people’s talents and aspirations. For example, we’re in party conference season and the Conservatives are gathering in Manchester as I write. Yet most politicians (with a few rare exceptions) overlook learning disabled people – despite the fact that more than a million people with learning disabilites are entitled to vote. This is not only an equality issue – why does the political world seem to bypass people who have both a right and a desire to go to the polls? – but vote-needy politicians could do with wooing this signifcant chunk of the electorate.

Many of this book’s supporters (scroll down on this page to “Supporters”) including campaigners, activists, self-advocates and support providers – are among a strong and growing lobby working hard (all year round – not just during conference season) to change this. I’m looking forward to reflecting the vital growth in this kind of activism and awareness-raising in Made Possible.

* This post is based on an update originally published on the Unbound website

Made Possible hits the midway milestone

This post is based on a piece originally posted on the Unbound website

There has been surge of support for Made Possible, the non-fiction book challenging learning disability stereotypes I’m crowdfunding with the award-winning publisher Unbound. The crowdfunding campaign has been so popular that the anthology is more than halfway to being published – just three weeks after launch. Wow (the background to the book is in this previous post).

I’m so grateful to everyone who’s pre-ordering Made Possible (all supporters get their name printed in the book), as well as sharing its aims and inviting others to get involved. As I write this update, there are 127 people in our Made Possible community, and I’m absolutely delighted that the book’s incredible range of supporters includes learning disability self-advocates, family members, campaigners, professionals, support organisations and people interested in human rights.

If you’re on social media, do follow #MadePossible and connect on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or Instagram – I’d welcome the chance to hear from you if you fancy saying hello.

During Unbound’s recent Anthology Week, which offered a social media focus on the publisher’s essay or story collections, some Made Possible makers tweeted about why they decided to help publish Made Possible:,


Thanks so much to everyone for joining the growing campaign to publish this book; I’m looking forward to seeing what the next week brings.

*Find out more about Made Possible on Unbound, or follow @Saba_Salman and #MadePosible on social media

Attitudes must change: launching Made Possible

This update was originally posted on Unbound on Sunday 10 Sept:

First off, a HUGE thank you to all you brilliant early bird pledgers for getting Made Possible off the ground – I’ve been blown away by your support, feedback, encouragement and enthusiasm.

Your help in creating this book means that Made Possible reached a major crowdfunding milestone after just 2 days – the 25% mark. Sensational – we’ve not even been going for a week and we’re a quarter funded!

Thanks too to those of you who’ve fearlessly embraced the unfamiliar waters of crowdfunding; this is all new to me too, so we’re in it together.

Some of you have asked why this method to create Made Possible. Good question. Unbound felt right, not least because it’s an award-winning publishing company, but because it connects readers directly with the books they want to see written. In a nutshell, you support the book you want to read – without your pledge, the book can’t get published. And Unbound breaks the traditional boundary between reader and writer – an approach that overturns the status quo seemed like absolutely the right fit for a book that aims to do the same thing.

So here we all are, this is now our Made Possible community! Thank you for being a part of it – it’s going to grow, and as it does, we get closer to the aim of challenging some very outdated mindsets about learning disability.

If you’ve pledged, please do share the news about what you’re helping to create, and encourage others to help make this happen. You can use #MadePossible on social media and see who else is talking about what we’re trying to do.

Thanks everyone, and more soon,
Saba