Mairian Corker wrote in part:
> this is relevant, though a kind of reverse argument. Is there not a
> question here about the nature of the experience of oppression -
> specifically *whose* experience - which has been lost in our attempts to
> collectivise the notion of disability? (For the benefit of the purists, I'm
> not suggesting that this collectivising is a bad thing, only that perhaps
> we need to conceptualise it differently). I don't deny that parents of
> disabled children are oppressed, but what I think we need to address is
> whether this is *disability* oppression. For example, when parents enter
> into these awful tussles with medical and educational 'professionals', is
> this about *disability* or is it about unequal professional/'amateur' power
> relations that many *patients/clients* experience? I know they are linked,
> but are they the same thing? Priscilla Alderson has done some excellent
> work on this, though not quite in the context I'm referring to.
I believe it is professional v. amateur power struggle at work -- thanks for
coming up with the terminology I've been trying to find. Although these
struggles are a result of an impairment's existence, it is not really about the
impairment but rather about power (for lack of a better term) over a child's
well-being (however that is defined). The same struggles occur, in varying
degrees, between parents and professionals with non disabled children and
Disabled children concerning school systems (disciplinary action, placement in
classes, etc.), the foster care system, social services responding to calls of
abuse and/or neglect, etc.
--
Carolyn
check out, "Passing, Invisibility and Other Psychotic Stuff" at
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