Linkspam: Disability, whether to 'pass' or 'perform'?

[davidgillon]

Passing for Normal: The Austerity Politics of Visibility and Invisibility for Disabled People*

Fascinating academic paper by a friend of mine looking at the contradictory pressures of stigma and 'legitimacy' that drive disabled people towards either concealing or 'performing' their disability.

I think the way Naomi links the pressure towards 'legitimacy' into the wider aspects of the 'surveillance society' is really thought-provoking, as is 'the socially acceptable right of non-disabled people to invade the privacy of disabled people', while considering the DLA form as a mandatory, self-enforced version of the panopticon, oh my! Definitely worth a read if you're interested in disability politics, or just stuck between 'passing' and 'performing'.

* Site does require registration via FB or Google, but it's the first time I've seen a registration that lets you control what information is passed.

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

D/Led and queued for tomorrow's bus reading. It sounds excellent (in its rigor) and horrible (in the topic) and thanks so much for linking it.