Abrams SOCY 122 2024 Slides

Question 1

The Sociology of Disability

Answer 1

Disability is not just a medical problem. Disability allows us to look at sociology through BIG and SMALL social phenomena.

Question 2

Reframe sociology Big

Answer 2

How does disability relate to economic and social structure?

• Disability has historically been seen through means of doing work.
• Capacity to be able, is the capacity to work
• Poor laws, deserving poor vs. undeserving poor
• The moral distinction between the able and those who cannot work
• Ideas of disability have come from moral decisions

Ex: disability and capital production

Ex. alcoholic homeless vs. homeless due to high cost of living

Question 3

Disability studies

Answer 3

An academic approach exploring the cultural production of ability and disability, opposing disability as a bio-economic deficit.

*disability isn’t just a problem that costs money and takes away from life.

• employment relations
• institutions where disabilities are made meaningful
• institutions make the difference of the body and mind apparent
• disability is not just something to be fixed, it’s supposed to add meaning to the world
• Ability and disability a cultural products

Question 4

Reframe sociology Small

Answer 4

How do we navigate our individual lives around bodily differences?

• Small-scale social interactions
• Stigma, talking about a certain group marking difference
• a mark of difference we change our lives around
• Goffman, stigma is related to small-scale rituals of everyday life

Ex: stigma and impression management

Question 5

Social Model
Mike Oliver

Answer 5

Impairment
- muscular dystrophy
- individual characteristics of the body

disability
- Physical barriers
- exterior barriers an individual experiences

• we have to make a distinction between impairment vs disability
• Disability is the outcome of barriers
• we need to focus not on problem bodies but instead, on problem environments

Take away:
Disability is an economic outcome, not a bodily problem

The issue with this model:

• ignores mental disabilities and disabilities that are less visible

Question 6

Disability and Politics of Language

Answer 6

PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES
- ‘Person first’ language and a liberal politics of disability
*not reduce a person to their disability
*Disabled = broken
*Disabilities should not define a person

DISABLED | DISABLEMENT
- Activist approaches, focusing on disability as a shared identity, the basis of politics
*Acknowledging the stigma
*Not a bad word; part of my identity

ANTIQUATED TERMINOLOGY
- SPECIAL NEEDS
- DIFFERENTLY ABLED
*Differently abled?!! Dumb word.
- HANDICAPPED

*Reclaiming “crip”

the language we use every day implies politics

Question 7

CHILDHOOD DISABILITY
Institution of the family

Answer 7

How do we frame childhood disability in media campaigns?

Sick Kids ads want us to donate
- Disability; something that needs to be fixed
- The charity model makes us think of those with disabilities as less of a person
- We dehumanize people when we treat them as less

Example:
SickKids VS. How is childhood disability made a problem with a charitable solution?

Question 8

DISABILITY + DATING +
DIGITAL PLATFORMS

Answer 8

How do disabled people navigate dating platforms looking for romance?

How does this align with other forms of intersecting oppression and identity?

• Belief that disabled people are asexual (WRONG)
• worthy of pity, but not love
• difference between how we depict disability visible and invisible
• politics or language and barriers are manifested in these online dating apps