Larry wrote:
>
> No doubt I am going to appear stupid and people will ask what am I doing on
> a reserch list if I can't understand the language but holistic ontology has
> got me stumped.
>
> Granted I use contorted language myself at times, but this needs an
> explanation if I am to understand it. Holistic I understand, ontology, I
> have found in my dictionary but the two together ??? explain please.
I have trouble with this concept too, though I understand what Pauline means
by it - disability is a "holistic ontology" in the sense that hegemony
demands that all disabled people have the same "ways of being" i.e broken,
diseased, dependent, impaired etc. This is particularly disabling to
disabled people who do not perceive themselves in this way. Equally,
however, the disabled people's movement has its own "holistic ontology" that
perceives disabled people as 'positive', proud and politically empowered.
This is disabling to people for whom impairment effects are very real. Thus
whichever way we look at it, "holistic ontology" is disabling. I still think
that it is at the level of ontology that we can begin to examine complexity,
but that is endangered when we go down the "holistic" road because it
ultimately cancels out different forms of power and different kinds of
agency.
>
> Apart from that glitch, my position on things is probably not an objective
> reserch one, in that although an individual may experience and internalise a
> certain view of themselves, this view may well be one that is more informed
> by oppression without, therefore with regard to the external societal
> worldview that has generated the internal view, I regard the internal view
> not only to be wrong but one that stands in the way of self expression and
> empowerment so in effect I do not accept it and would on encountering such a
> view wish to change it. Put it another way, if you encounter racism for
> instance, do you not want to challenge it?
>
> Now that is neither an advocates nor a reserchers position but an activists.
>
> Look at it another way, we are all about changing other peoples opinions
> whether we admit it or not. Anyone who is presenting a piece of reserch is
> hoping to win the herts and minds of those who read it, is wishing to
> influence opinions to regard there work not only favorably but as correct,
> or am I mistaken?
No research is objective. It's always been the case and still is the case.
That's why in some fields such as anthropology, there has been an increasing
emphasis on researcher reflexivity as well as transparency. Disability
studies current position is that having "an accredited impairment" is not a
necessary prerequisite for doing disability research. Moreover employing
disabled researchers has "serious resource implications" (Oliver and Barnes,
1997). Put another way, exclusion boils down to money and the knowledge and
skills of people with accredited impairments is downplayed. Nevertheless,
when people do research, they go into it with their own backgrounds, and
their interpretations of the data are equally driven by these backgrounds.
Even in the so-called emancipatory research setting, there is a huge gulf
between wanting to challenge racism, sexism homophobia or (dis)ableism and
being able to do so in a way that has lasting emancipatory effects. It is
more common to achieve local effects. Emancipatory researchers who live with
the day to day experience of the oppression that they are investigating in
the research setting, are frequently disempowered by the very structures and
attitudes that disempower those they do research with. In teams of disabled
/non-disabled researchers it is rare for non-disabled researchers to
challenge these structures and attitudes as they relate to the disabled
researcher.
As to the "correctness" of the work, most research is highly contextualised
and research outcomes are at best always preliminary, even if most
researchers like to generalise their findings as "correct" and as applicable
to any context, culture or time. Most emancipatory research outcomes would
be regarded as morally correct, but the cost of implementing these outcomes
would equally be seen as practically impossible. This gives powerholders an
excuse for saying that the research itself is wrong. For example, I recently
witnessed prevalent behaviour on the part of non-disabled adults towards
disabled children that in most circumstances would be regarded as
oppressive, if not abusive, and which acted as a barrier to the children's
learning. You could argue that I only recognised this because I've
experienced it, which might well be the case and I wouldn't pretend
otherwise. However, I recorded these events in exactly the same way as I
recorded all events on that project, some of which illustrated better
practice. When these adults saw my documentation of these specific events, I
was accused of lying and this, in their view, invalidated the research as a
whole. They were not "wrong", I was. Disability studies, on the other hand,
so far, chooses to see these "negative" research findings as a "minority
perspective" and to dismiss them by emphasising that there are of course
lots of (unspecified) examples of "good practice" out there. Interesting ...
Best wishes
Mairian
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