“Disabled people get told both how and how not to identify a lot,” says Poppy Greenfield. “You’re not diasbled, you’re specially-abled. Stuff like that caters more to non-disabled people and the stigma around disability than anything. If you see my disability, my access needs can be met. We can work from there. Build something better.”

Poppy’s podcast, Call Me Disabled, has hopes of doing just that, as a celebration and consideration of disabled lives. Told through intimate and illuminating interviews in each episode with disabled activists, authors, artists, and people she admires, Poppy will explore ideas of identity, accessibility, and the future. More than anything, it’s an act of radical advocacy – a rallying call to action for transforming society and recognising individual needs for the collective good. “I want to call myself disabled,” she explains, “there’s a power in it, and a potential to progress. This podcast is for anyone on that journey or who might not even have considered it yet.”

Last year, Call Me Disabled was chosen as a winner of Acast Amplifier, an incubator programme to discover, establish and promote new podcast ideas. Poppy has been receiving support in the form of equipment, a grant, mentorship, studio time and artwork from Acast - all to help launch her podcasts.
With the support of Acast, Call Me Disabled is available across all podcast platforms and ultimately has access to Acast's monetisation products, including advertising, sponsorship, and brand collaborations.

Poppy is an advocate for disability and inclusion: she founded a forward-thinking digital space to celebrate ‘adaptive fashion’ –  fashion with function that caters to disabled bodies – and she's acted as a consultant for brands from Tommy Hilfilger to Sony Playstation. She’s honest about her own turbulent path to accepting and expanding her identity as a disabled woman. Disabled all of her life, it only became more pertinent in her childhood and teenage years when she became bedbound by chronic pain. Age 19, she was ready to explore what it meant for her in a society that sidelines anyone not able-bodied.

“There are so many stereotypes and misconceptions. I really want to confront people with the realities of disability, that access shouldn’t be the afterthought it is,” Poppy says. “It benefits us all to break down these barriers.”

We live in a time where the borders of our bodies are constantly being policed – our reproductive rights, autonomy over our gender, displacement and deportation, the mass disabling event that is a worldwide pandemic. She hopes this series will bring people into one of the most urgent conversations of our time, and educate non-disabled people about how ableism affects their own lives. “It’s not a case of if you become disabled, it's a case of when you become disabled,” Poppy says. “We’re all ageing. We’ll all experience disability, whether permanent or as temporary as pregnancy or breaking a leg. Ableism harms us all.”

With her guests, Poppy will pass the mic to the voices that aren’t usually given the airtime, in and outside of the disabled community. “I’m very aware that I present what is seen as a palatable disabled experience, as a white woman. I want to use the privilege I have to amplify other voices in this community – queer people, trans people, people of colour, global voices. You cannot dismantle ableism without being intersectional,” Poppy says. She’s particularly inspired by the work of Keah Brown, a writer, activist, and the creator of the #DisabledAndCute, and Samantha Renke, a disability activist and author of You Are The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread. With a wide framework of references, she hopes to create a Call Me Disabled community that dapples the dialogue with a keen eye on issues at hand, while still offering a welcoming, warm space to ask questions and a mission to spark joy.

“I want to show how multifaceted and multidimensional the lives of disabled people are,” she says. “We’re joyful and varied. Ultimately, I inhabit a disability, but I can also be more than it.”