Week 10

Question 1

Who is Susan Wendell?

Answer 1

-She wrote ‘The Social Construction of Disability’ in The Rejected Body: Feminist Philosophical Reflections on Disability (1996)
-Her analysis of disability questions the adequacy of feminist theories of embodiment since they tend to focus heavily on non-disabled experience (Demands for intersectionality!)
-There must be an integration of the knowledge & experience of disabled people into feminist ethics, discussions of lived body & life, & the criticism of medical authority.

Question 2

Wendell Thesis and Position

Answer 2

-Biological Reality & Social Construction of Disability interact, thus sharply distinguishing them is not possible.
-Social arrangements can make the biological condition more or less relevant to almost any situation.
-Disability is created by the social & physical environment: people with physical or mental impairments become disabled when they’re placed in an environment that doesn’t support their needs
-Our social environment fosters disability in several ways: if we change the environment we can eliminate much of ‘disability’ in our society.

Question 3

Wendell/ Social Factors that Construct Disability

Answer 3

-Disability is Socially Constructed through the failure or unwillingness to create ability among people who do not fit the physical/ mental profile of ‘paradigm’ citizens.
-Cultural Constructions of Disability: cultural stereotypes, stigmatization of limitations, cultural meanings attached to various types of disability, & exclusion from activities they cannot perform or are expected not to perform.
-Disability as a Social & Cultural Construction disproportionately disadvantages women.

Question 4

Wendell/ Solution

Answer 4

-We can Deconstruct Disability
-Need to put people with a wide array of disabilities in charge of the efforts to deconstruct, not just a token few
-Obstacles to deconstruction disability
-wendell says that women experience disability differently & often more harshly.

Question 5

Kirsty Liddiard

Answer 5

-Our culture often does not acknowledge the sexual selves, lives or feelings of the disabled- we often think of them as asexual, as having a lack of sexual feeling or desire.
-Those with cognitive impairments are thought to not understand sexuality or to have sexual feelings out of their control or that are deviant
-Any acknowledgement of sexual identity for the disabled tends to be heteronormative, leaving LGBTQ+ disabled persons marginalized further

Question 6

Liddiard/ Power of Narrative

Answer 6

-Disabled women’s stories are distinctly moulded by patriarchy, sexism & misogyny
-Power of Narrative: stories of disabled women about sex, intimacy, desire & relationships
-Veil of shame & embarrassed to articulate desire & pleasures
-Self-hatred & lack of confidence because of failing to embody ableist & sexist ideals of womanhood ‘properly’ or enough for themselves & their partners

Question 7

Liddiard/ Disabled women

Answer 7

-Experience higher rates of sexual violence than disabled men & non-disabled women, heightened by a lack of privacy & few avenues available for disabled women to report or escape violence.
-Disabled women of colour, women that are indigenous, immigrant or refugee experience worse violence
-Many disabled women struggled to claim positive sexual selfhood because of silence which surrounds the sexual lives of disabled women in mainstream culture.

Question 8

Liddiard/ Solutions

Answer 8

-‘Cripping Sex’- seeing the disabled body as sexy & finding its unique erogenous zones
-Disabled bodies can expand & envelope pleasure in new, exciting ways
-It is crucial for disabled women & girls to reclaim sexy from the oppressive ways society tends to communicate it; to define it for themselves & their unique bodies
-We must learn to see the disabled as sexual beings like any other & encourage them to find their sexual selfhood.