Hi,
The only reason I asked this question is because Lennard suggested that
there was no reason to fear disability studies being 'taken over' by
non-disabled people. I disagree with this view and I feel that there is
already evidence that it is happening in some spheres, but it is evidence
that is difficult to uncover. I'm not asking those who choose not to
identify as disabled to 'out' themselves nor am I asking colleagues to do
so. That makes the campaign personal and contrary to what Lennard seems to
think, I am actually trying to argue this on an academic level based on
Lennard's published work and my published work.
In the UK, we are trying very hard in all sorts of ways to ensure that the
Disability Studies agenda - from decisions about who decides, through
research methodology, to publication - is driven by disabled people, both
grass-roots activists and activist academics. I myself have never published
anything that 'just strategically occurs to me' - in other words I don't
determine the strategy, as is being implied. I do a lot of listening and I
take up issues that disabled people ask me to take up, often because they
are too scared to say what they think publicly and directly. I don't make
claims about representation. When I produce an edited collection, I do not
exclude non-disabled people, but I do have a strategy of 'positive action'
making sure that the volumes have a majority of disabled contributors,
'out' or not, because I believe this makes a difference in a small way.
Increasingly, non-disabled colleagues in Disability Studies are also
adopting these strategies and indeed, the international journal, Disability
& Society, of which I am an Executive Editor, has always sought to equalise
in a similar way - four out of six of the Exec. Editors (including myself)
are disabled people, each with a different impairment.
Best wishes, Mairian
>I absolutely agree that Mairian's question is valid and politically
>important. I was simply pointing out certain assumptions that underlay it,
>as well as its implied answer in relation to disability studies texts. I
>also think that your point about the fluctuating nature of in/visibility is
>crucial. But I guess I was also questioning whether the way Mairian's
>question was phrased and/or contextualized did not implicitly lead to a
>politics of 'outing' and compulsory 'out-ness'. And questioning whether
>that is in fact a political regulatory regime of disabled research and
>disabled movement that everyone wants to support? And I think that these
>too are important questions.
>Natasha Kraus
>
>
>
>At 02:42 AM 10/20/99 -0400, you wrote:
>>The difficulty of answering Mairian's question, with perfectly accurate
>>numbers -- about who controls disability studies == does not subtract
>>one bit from the question's validity, or political importance.
>
>>"Invisibility" can be an opportunity to hear bias stuff, which you
>>otherwise might not hear. But it's also not necessarily a fixed
>>condition, always "on" (or "off") in an individual's life... nor one
>>totally under the person's control, if they're trying to be invisible.
>>With some disabilities, sometimes the situation removes any element of
>>disclosure choice, and "outs" the person. So what's "invisible" in the
>>morning, may become "visible" in the afternoon.
>>
>>But that fluidity of reality, in no way subtracts from the importance of
>>Mairian's question.
>>
>>
>Natasha Kirsten Kraus
>Assistant Professor
>Department of Sociology
>430 Park Hall
>Box 604140
>University at Buffalo-SUNY
>Buffalo, NY 14260-4140
>[log in to unmask]
>(716)645-2417 x 457
Mairian Corker
Senior Research Fellow in Deaf and Disability Studies
Department of Education Studies
University of Central Lancashire
Preston PR1 2HE
Address for correspondence:
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