Dear Susan,
I think we agree more than disagree. I completely agree with your
remarks about human variation, etc. However, I would argue that the
problems you identify with the category of cognitive 'impairment' are
problems with the identification and classification of impairment *per
se,* not simply with what is classified as "cognitive" impairment. (I'd
love to discuss this with you more off-list.) Remember: I said in my
initial post on this that I want to problematize the category of
impairment and its position in the social model.
I agree with your preference for the term "disabled" (i.e. as signifying
a subject-position in a relation of oppression, etc.), but not with your
preference for the term "cognitively disabled". I use the term
"cognitive impairment" as a marker as this point in time because I don't
think the modes of oppession to which this sector of the disabled
population is subjected have yet been acknowledged. It seems to me that
if you want to use the term "cognitively disabled" in the way that I
interpret you do, then you should also want to use terms like
"physically" disabled (to signify, for instance, someone discriminated
against due to exclusionary architecture) and "sensorially" disabled (to
signify, for instance, someone who is disabled by the assumption that
information should be produced in print only). *Maybe I have
misunderstood you here. If I have, perhaps it would help me if you were
to reiterate and rephrase your arguments in this context.* But, to
continue..
I see a number of problems with construing, or dividing up, disability
oppression in this way. I'll just mention two. First, some people who
have experienced (for instance) brain injury are confronted by
discrimination across all of these categories, so their experiences of
disability oppression are simplified, reduced, if not obscured and
effaced when they are considered only "cognitively" disabled in the way
I think you are using the term. Second, there are often significant
cognitive and psycho-emotional affects of disability oppression for
those who would be considered "physically" disabled (on what I take to
be your preferred scheme). In her book FEMALE FORMS: EXPERIENCING AND
UNDERSTANDING DISABILITY, Carol Thomas makes an argument like the second
one I have here in order to make her own call for a redefinition of
disability in the terms of the social model.
Thanks for your note. I look forward to your response.
Best regards,
Shelley Tremain, PhD,
The Roeher Institute
Susan Gabel wrote:
> Further, I'm unconvinced that calling someone else or one's self cognitively > impaired is any better or worse than using the term cognitively disabled. Right now, I prefer disabled because it signifies that this is an individual who experiences or is likely to experience oppression, discrimination, labeling, etc., due to cognitive traits or what we assume from the outside are "abnormal" cognitive traits. If impairment is used, I believe it allows the speaker and listener to assume that cognition is somehow damaged or not working properly without assuming there will be oppressive consequences. In addition, it assumes the medical/psychological/educational diagnosis is correct and that there is, in fact, an impairment. On the contrary, there are many "false positives" or inaccurate diagnoses. In addition, even when
> we might agree that a diagnosis is accurate, how can we be sure we aren't just identifying human cognitive variation and calling it cognitive impairment? Furhtermore, it seems to me to be inevitable that as soon as a person is identified as cognitively "impaired," that individual immediately becomes a very different person who experiences markedly different social relations. In a sense, identifying someone as having impaired cognition alters society's view of that body (or brain) in ways similar to tattooing or body piercing: the tattooed, pierced, or IQ'd person is visibly "different" and clearly "belongs" to group of other "different" people. In this case, the person belongs to people whose brains "don't work right." My argument is that as soon as a person is identified as such, and regardless of what that person might be doing with his/her life, there is no choice in the matter: that person is a disabled person.
>
>
Perhaps this is similar to what you are arguing, Shelly, and I just
didn't
> see it. I'd really like to hear more of your argument about this issue, on
> or off list.
>
> I also share this information because there may be someone out there doing
> similar work who would like to collaborate in some way. If so, let me know!
>
> Finally, a few years ago there was a good book published by an
> anthropologist, F. A. Hanson, from the US. The text was an enormous help
> to me and I strongly recommend it. I think it still holds up today. The
> book is " Testing Testing: Social Consequences of the Examined Life,"
> 1993, University of California Press.
>
> Susan Gabel, PhD
> University of Michigan
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