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>Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1999 13:28:05 -0800
>Reply-To: Disabled Student Services in Higher Education
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>Sender: Disabled Student Services in Higher Education
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>From: "Fletcher, Debra" <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: article
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>
>The Chronicle of Higher Education
>>From the issue dated January 29, 1999
>
>
>
> POINT OF VIEW
>
> When the Body Begins to Fall Apart on the
> Academic Stage
>
> By LUCIA PERILLO
>
> I used to teach at a college attached to a Benedictine
>monastery,
> and though I never quite understood how anyone could
>find
> happiness in the monastic life (bad food, no sex), my
>religious
> colleagues inspired my envy for one reason: They could
>wear robes
> to work. Black robes, under which they wore old jeans
>or
> sweatpants or even their pajamas -- I gauged this from
>the two
> inches of leg exposed below the hem. While the rest of
>us were
> sized up via our clothing and hairstyles, our wearing
>of makeup or
> going without, the monks were able to impart knowledge
>in a
> manner that seemed pure. They seemed to be almost
>blank slates.
> From neck to ankle, at least, the monks were liberated
>from the
> scrutiny of their audience.
>
> In lieu of wearing a robe, I have often thought about
>teaching with a
> paper bag over my head. It would have to be a big bag,
>though,
> because I'd want it to cover my entire body. My
>teaching life has
> coincided with a period during which I have grown
>increasingly
> disabled, and as I grow older -- and my body becomes
>more
> decrepit -- I find myself intimidated by the degree to
>which teaching
> is measured in terms of its performance quality, the
>body being the
> prime instrument of performance.
>
> Actually, I was once a good performer. In my former
>career, as a
> park ranger, I did an impersonation of the first woman
>to climb
> Mount Rainier that brought standing ovations from the
>campfire
> crowd. The first symptom of the disease that I later
>found out I had
> -- it turned out to be multiple sclerosis -- showed up
>at my first
> faculty meeting on my first academic job, shortly
>after my last
> ranger summer, when I stood to introduce myself and
>went into a
> swoon. The rest of the faculty members no doubt
>wondered what
> kind of nut they'd just hired. Afterward, a theater
>professor offered
> to help me overcome my stage fright.
>
> It's bad enough to have to cope, privately, with one's
>body falling
> apart; there's something grotesque about having to
>display that
> disintegration on a public stage. With real actors,
>the hook comes
> from the wings as soon as the body starts to falter,
>even if that
> faltering comes from mere age (and especially if the
>body in
> question belongs to a woman). Multiple sclerosis,
>though extremely
> variable in effect, sometimes can be a not
>particularly pleasant sight
> to behold in its latter stages. The comedian Richard
>Pryor --
> perhaps the most famous performer to become affected
>by M.S. --
> has not been much in public view since his disease
>became visibly
> apparent.
>
> I was thinking about those concerns -- and my own
>presentation of
> my body -- while watching the recent remake of
>Hitchcock's Rear
> Window. In this version, the Jimmy Stewart character
>was played
> by Christopher Reeve, who (as the whole world knows)
>has been
> a quadriplegic since a riding accident some years
>back. It was not a
> particularly good remake (I don't know why anyone
>bothers trying
> to remake Hitchcock), but I was relieved to see that
>the reasons it
> didn't work had little to do with Reeve's being in a
>wheelchair. The
> technology that is now essential to him pretty much
>faded into
> invisibility when the suspense kicked in. (If
>anything, the movie
> failed because the suspense was not cultivated to its
>fullest effect.)
>
> While teaching does not require the level of physical
>dexterity that
> acting does, it does require a demanding schedule of
>public display,
> often in front of hundreds of people, many times a
>week.
>
> In the first stages of my illness, I found myself
>annoyed that my
> students were so blankly oblivious to the fact that
>there was
> anything wrong with me. I remember struggling to
>return some
> papers and hearing grumbling and groans when I finally
>gave up
> and asked the students to come to me. On the other
>hand, I was
> paranoid when students began noticing that something
>indeed was
> wrong: "Why are you walking funny?" they asked. My
>response
> was a puzzled glower: "Who says I'm walking funny?"
>
> Now the jig is up -- okay, I do walk funny. The
>progress of the
> disease, fortunately, has been slower than the speed
>at which
> students go through my classes, and those who know me
>now have
> always known me as disabled, which relieves me from
>having to
> provide explanations. For the most part, students have
>been
> gracious and kind and truly helpful, to the point of
>packing up
> boxes to help me move. But it makes me feel strange,
>this intimacy
> into which I am forced with my students, who will see
>my
> symptoms wax (and wane -- but mostly wax,
>unfortunately). For
> most professors, the functioning of their bodies is
>not something
> they have to share with their students. And though it
>seems a
> violation of professional "distance" to allude to my
>physical
> troubles, it also seems disingenuous to pretend that
>nothing's
> wrong.
>
> Disability can transform self-presentation in all
>manner of peculiar
> ways: One new chapter in the continuing saga of my
>illness is that
> wearing pantyhose (a loathsome word) now makes my legs
>feel as
> though they've been tightly wound with bandages. A
>minor
> impairment, I thought -- easily shed by switching from
>skirts to
> pants -- until I read a recent article in The
>Chronicle about the
> signals sent by professional attire: Several people
>made the
> comment that job interviewees should wear skirts
>instead of pants
> (that is, so long as they are women). If there are to
>be no skirts for
> me, then no new jobs for me, I guess.
>
> Similarly, I remember years ago, when I was tending
>the job booth
> at a major academic convention, being lectured by one
>of my
> co-volunteers (obviously a higher-status member of the
>pack than
> I) about the hellish schedule to which her English
>department liked
> to subject job candidates. "We want to see whether
>they've got the
> stamina," she said, as if applying for an academic job
>were a tryout
> for the football team. My disability not yet visible,
>I didn't say what
> I thought: that this practice might unjustly eliminate
>many fine
> candidates whose bodies would not be able to tolerate
>the 48
> hours of grilling.
>
> While I'm wary of blanket statements about the
>so-called "disability
> experience," or even about M.S. in particular, I will
>say that, for
> me, being caught in the maelstrom of this illness has
>been like riding
> a hot-air balloon that's losing altitude: I've had to
>jettison whatever
> drags me down. My self-therapeutic process has mostly
>meant
> consciously cutting the number of things that I worry
>about -- if the
> people interviewing me for a job are so superficial
>that all they see
> when they look at me is a pair of pants, then I don't
>want to work
> with them. Sometimes my face goes numb and I drool out
>of one
> side of my mouth (not very flattering to one's
>self-image). But, hey,
> I tell myself, I've got more important things to worry
>about than a
> little spittle.
>
> Probably the biggest blow to my self-esteem as a
>public figure
> came last year, when I was invited to another college
>as a visiting
> poet. I gave my talk standing up, though I preceded it
>with the
> disclaimer that I might very well fall down and that
>if I did, the
> audience could do me a favor by pretending not to
>notice. But I
> made it through the hour on my feet, and so was
>feeling pretty good
> about myself -- until, while walking away from the
>podium, I
> tripped and rolled across the carpet.
>
> Of course, the people in the audience were trapped in
>a state of
> cognitive dissonance, confused about what they ought
>to do.
> Seeing them variously displaying sympathetic
>mortification and
> fright, while remembering that they were supposed to
>pretend this
> had not happened, caused me to burst out laughing.
>There I was,
> the visiting poet, lying on the auditorium floor in
>hysterics. It was a
> situation in which neither robe nor bag, I suppose,
>would have
> done me any good.
>
> Lucia Perillo is an associate professor of English at
>Southern
> Illinois University at Carbondale.
>
>
> http://chronicle.com
> Section: Opinion & Arts
> Page: A64
>
>
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Devva Kasnitz, PhD
Research Director,
Research and Training Center
on Independent Living and Disability Policy
World Institute on Disability
510 16 Street, Suite #100
Oakland, CA 94612-1500
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TTY: 510-208-9493
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