Judt wrote:
>What are you asking??? How about respite from being repeatedly
>dive-bombed by an obsessive, peseverative, highly strung, hair-trigger
>sensitive, empathy-less when stressed, illogical, mind-numbingly boring
>and repetitive, chaos-making, labour intensive, screechy voiced
>demanding little person who never sleeps???-
So that is one answer Judy, thanks. But surely it isn't the whole story,
which is why I asked the question.
>
>If you or Laurence have any concrete ideas on how "society" or "social
>services" can improve this situation, I'd love to know.
I think maybe we need to be careful here. I can't find the exact quote here
but Mike Oliver has written somewhere that the social model does not deny
the individual nor the medical and it is certainly not intended to solve
everything. It is intended to deal with institutionalised barriers and the
inequality it creates, but because it can't deal with everything, others
(including myself) are looking at other ways of thinking about disability.
I won't apologise for being a theorist; however, I think the logic of the
social model is that we have to identify what IS a social barrier and what
IS disability oppression and what DOES operate at the social level. But
this does not discount that some things cannot be dealt with at *this*
macro-level. I certainly have never said that the social model is the be
all and end all of everything and I don't think Laurence has either.
>
>And can you explain what you mean by respite versus support - what is
>this "respite" or "support" supposed to look like?
>
>I fully expect everyone to be up in arms, but I think that's because
>when disability theorists talk about the universal category of
>disability, what they're really thinking about is perfectly nice,
>rational people with physical impairments, and several University
>degrees just like themselves - Mairian, when you talk about disability,
>you seem to be talking about the deaf, but what is your understanding of
>the lived experience of people with intellectual/ communicative/
>neurological disorders and their families?
That is unfair Judy, because the social model (at least in the UK) has a
huge amount of support from people who do not 'fit' this steroetype.
However, your criticism is of course a legitimate criticism if aimed at
disability theory and practice and I've just written a paper on that very
topic that will be published at the end of the year. I think it's also
important, however, to accept that I have limits to my own knowledge and
experience, though I do try hard to move into other domains and listen to
what others say and write. Sure, I often talk about deaf people, but the
reason for that is because the list often seems to think about deafness as
if it were a *physical* impairment and believe me, I *do* think deafness
problematises the social model. But I don't think I'm different from anyone
else on this list in that respect, including you.
But, for example, when you give your answer to the respite from what?
question above I certainly DO recall my own experience of tinnitus. How do
I get 'respite' from the roaring, banging, whining noises in my head that
interrupt my sleep that makes me tired so I can't concentrate and gives me
visual disturbances and depression so that I have to stop working etc. etc.
And how do I at the same time live up to the images of pride and positivity
that are demanded of me by the disability movement and earn my livelihood?
I am not saying that this is in any way equivalent to what you have
described, simply that there are common threads. I don't have answers to
that question any more than I have answers to yours, but what I do know is
that if 'society' were to sometimes just stop and think 'Well maybe
Mairian's disorientated, angry, tearful because ...' instead of assuming
that 'Mairian's mad' I would feel less disabled. So there IS a social
element, and I venture also that there are many universal dimensions of
disability.
Best wishes
Mairian
Mairian Corker
Senior Research Fellow in Deaf and Disability Studies
Department of Education Studies
University of Central Lancashire
Preston PR1 2HE
Address for correspondence:
111 Balfour Road
Highbury
London N5 2HE
U.K.
Minicom/TTY +44 [0]171 359 8085
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