Does Public Disability History Need a Cultural Model of Disability?

by Anne Waldschmidt, University of Cologne

Until today, efforts to develop a cultural model of disability have been rare. However, in parallel with the development of the social model and its critical discussion and partly independent of it, during the past decades we have witnessed an increase in cultural studies with regard to disability. We can already identify cultural disability studies as an innovative and prolific research field carried out in the humanities (see for example Waldschmidt et al. 2017). Yet, it is striking that in contrast to the social model of disability, which is often accused of dogmatism, the field of cultural disability studies still looks more like a patchwork quilt. The latter has not yet found to unique contours, despite an ongoing discussion on the implications of culture for disability constructions.

The National Gallery architecture and Alison Lapper sculpture at Trafalgar Square, London, UK. Ph: CGP Grey

As early as 1994, Tom Shakespeare called for a stronger perception of cultural representations of disabled people. Inspired by feminist debates and discussing different theories, he suggested "that disabled people are 'objectified' by cultural representations" (287), under which he subsumed theatre, literature, paintings, films and the media. In the following years, prominent scholars in the Anglo-Saxon world such as Lennard J. Davis, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Robert McRuer, David T. Mitchell and Sharon L. Snyder, Margrit Shildrick, Tobin Siebers, Shelley Tremain and others, published a great variety of cultural and literary analyses showing the wealth and productivity of treating "disability as a cultural trope" (Garland-Thomson 2002: 2). In 2006, Snyder and Mitchell explicitly introduced a "cultural model of disability," but they defined it narrowly as an approach that was primarily associated with US-American Disability Studies. In introducing the phrase "cultural locations of disability," referring to "sites of violence, restriction, confinement, and absence of liberty for people with disabilities" (Snyder and Mitchell 2006: x), they offered a tool for interdisciplinary works on disability within and beyond cultural studies.

Additionally, some scholars have argued for the usefulness of a cultural model of disability to study intersections between migration, ethnicity, 'race' and disability. In 2005 Patrick J. Devlieger, who teaches cultural anthropology in Leuven (Belgium), pleaded, following Foucault, Derrida and Marx, and focussing on communication and cultural diversity, for a dialectical cultural model (see also Devlieger et al. 2016). Recent works in postcolonial studies ask the question "of how disability is figured in the global, postcolonial history of the modern" and aim "to highlight specific located examples of disability in cultural contexts" (Barker and Murray 2003: 65). Meanwhile, the cultural model of disability has also been acknowledged in religious studies as a 'key term.' In this context, Nyasha Junior and Jeremy Schipper (2013: 35) define it as an approach that analyses "how a culture's representations and discussions of disability (and nondisability or able-bodiedness) help to articulate a range of values, ideals, or expectations that are important to that culture's organization and identity." Disability History, however, has not yet witnessed the development of a cultural model of disability that takes into account the intersections of culture, history and society, although there are attempts that aim at conceptualising this field of research with respect to cultural studies (see Bösl et al. 2010; Barsch et al. 2013).

Generally speaking, we can state that there is an ongoing reflection on the strengths of a cultural approach to disability. At the same time, however, the respective 'model' still seems to have rather blurred features. Further, the debate tends to reproduce the dominance of English speaking disability studies and overlooks contributions from other countries, such as the longstanding works of French philosopher Henri-Jacques Stiker. With regard to Germany, both the interdisciplinary book series "Disability Studies," published since 2007 by Transcript, and the Edinburgh German Yearbook's fourth volume on disability in German literature, film, and theatre from 2010 show a great wealth of works drawing on a cultural studies approach. The editors of the yearbook, Eleoma Joshua and Michael Schillmeier (2010), define the cultural model as "the analysis of the representations of disabled people in the cultural spaces of art, media, and literature" (5) and even speak of a "cultural turn" in disability studies (4).

It is beyond the scope of this essay to discuss these different proposals extensively. Instead, I want to sketch my own approach. Based on contributions published in 2005 and 2012, the latter together with Werner Schneider, I develop a cultural model of disability for the purpose of providing a joint framework for the already numerously existing contributions that analyse disability with the help of methodologies and approaches originating from cultural studies (see also Waldschmidt 2017). My intention is not to suggest that a cultural model should replace the social model of disability. Rather, critical disability studies, including disability history, should acknowledge that disability is both socially and culturally constructed.

What is the core of a cultural model of disability? My main point is that such a cultural model needs to reflect first of all its own understanding of culture. As both a social practice and an analytical category, culture does not only imply cultural activities in the narrow sense, be it so-called high culture or popular culture. Instead, for innovative research it is much more productive to apply a broad conception of culture that denotes the totality of 'things' created and employed by a particular people or a society at a given time in history, be they material or immaterial: objects and instruments, institutions and organisations, ideas and knowledge, symbols and values, meanings and interpretations, narratives and histories, traditions, rituals and customs, social behaviour, attitudes and identities. In this sense the public sphere, be it the public opinion, the public interest, public awareness or any other form of 'res publica,' is ultimately part of the culture of a given society. Hence, if we are going public, for example, in the streets or via social media, we are 'doing culture' in some way or other.In my opinion, if we were to use such a general understanding of culture, a cultural model of disability would not be dismissed as focalising only symbols and meanings, but could broaden our analytical perspective to investigate the relations between symbolic (knowledge) systems, categorization and institutionalisation processes, material artefacts, practices and 'ways of doing things,' and their consequences for persons with and without disabilities, their social positions, relations and ways of subjectivation. Thus, such a cultural disability model differs from other approaches in important aspects: It considers disability neither – as in the individualistic-reductionist model of disability – only as an individual fate nor – as in the social model – as merely an effect of discrimination and exclusion. Rather, this model questions the other side of the coin, the commonly unchallenged 'normality,' and investigates how practices of (de-)normalization result in the social category we have come to call 'disability.' The cultural model of disability implies a fundamental change of the epistemological perspective, since it does not deal with the margin but rather with the 'centre' of society. Against this background, 'doing public disability history' means not only to confront the wider public with disabled persons' perspectives, but to inspire critical self-reflections of those who consider themselves 'non-disabled' and to stimulate a public debate about what it means to be 'normal.'

Recommended Citation:
Anne Waldschmidt (2017): Does Public Disability History Need a Cultural Model of Disability?. In: Public Disability History 2 (2017) 7.

References
Barker, Clare and Stuart Murray. "Disabling Postcolonialism: Global Disability Cultures and Democratic Criticism." The Disability Studies Reader. Ed. Lennard J. Davis. New York, Milton Park: Routledge, 2013 (4th ed.). 61-73.
Barsch, Sebastian, Anne Klein and Peter Verstraete (eds.) The Imperfect Historian: Disability Histories in Europe. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2013.
Bösl, Elsbeth, Anne Klein and Anne Waldschmidt (eds.). Disability History: Konstruktionen von Behinderung in der Geschichte. Eine Einführung. Bielefeld: transcript, 2010.
Devlieger, Patrick J. "Generating a Cultural Model of Disability." Paper presented at the 19th Congress of the European Federation of Associations of Teachers of the Deaf (FEAPDA), October 14-16, 2005. Accessed 02 June 2011 under: <http://feapda.org/Geneva%20Files/culturalmodelofdisability.pdf>.
Devlieger, Patrick, Beatriz Miranda-Galarza, Steven E. Brown and Megan Strickfaden (eds.). Rethinking Disability. World Perspectives in Culture and Society. Antwerp-Appeldorn: Garant, 2016.
Ellis, Katie. Disability and Popular Culture: Focusing Passion, Creating Community and Expressing Defiance. Farnham: Ashgate, 2015.
Garland-Thomson, Rosemarie. "Integrating Disability, Transforming Feminist Theory." Feminist Disability Studies. NWSA Journal 14.3 (2002). 1-32. Accessed 25 Feb. 2013 under: <http://www.jstor.org/stable/4316922>.
Joshua, Eleoma and Michael Schillmeier. "Introduction." Disability in German Literature, Film, and Theater. Edinburgh German Yearbook. Volume 4. Rochester, New York: Camden House, 2010. 1-13.
Junior, Nyasha and Jeremy Schipper. "Disability Studies and the Bible." New Meanings for Ancient Texts: Recent Approaches to Biblical Criticisms and Their Applications. Eds. Steven L. McKenzie and John Kaltner. Westminster: John Knox Press, 2013. 21-37.
Schneider, Werner and Anne Waldschmidt. "Disability Studies: (Nicht-)Behinderung Anders Denken." Kultur. Von den Cultural Studies bis zu den Visual Studies: Eine Einführung. Ed. Stephan Moebius. Bielefeld: transcript, 2012. 128-150.
Shakespeare, Tom. "Cultural Representation of Disabled People: Dustbins for Disavowal?" Disability & Society 9.3 (1994). 283-299.
Snyder, Sharon L. and David T. Mitchell. Cultural Locations of Disability. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006.
Waldschmidt, Anne. "Disability Studies: Individuelles, soziales und/oder kulturelles Modell von Behinderung?" Psychologie & Gesellschaftskritik 29.1. (2005). 9-31.
Waldschmidt, Anne. "Disability Goes Cultural: The Cultural Model of Disability as an Analytical Tool." Culture – Theory – Disability: Encounters between Disability Studies and Cultural Studies. Eds. Anne Waldschmidt, Hanjo Berressem and Moritz Ingwersen. Bielefeld: transcript, 2017. 19-27. Accessed 22 March 2017 under: <http://www.transcript-verlag.de/media/pdf/c3518f77daff835d007919eeac733c3a.pdf>.
Waldschmidt, Anne, Hanjo Berressem and Moritz Ingwersen (eds.). Culture – Theory – Disability: Encounters between Disability Studies and Cultural Studies. Bielefeld: transcript, 2017.

Links

International Research Unit in Disability Studies at the University of Cologne, Germany: http://idis-eng.uni-koeln.de/
Waldschmidt, Anne, Hanjo Berressem and Moritz Ingwersen (eds.). Culture – Theory – Disability: Encounters between Disability Studies and Cultural Studies. Bielefeld: transcript, 2017. ISBN 978-3-8394-2533-6 (open access) https://www.degruyter.com/viewbooktoc/product/430191

Read More

Ubuntu and ways of being in the world: Listening to my colleagues describe Southern African disability history and theory

By Maria Berghs

I am not a historian but I got curious about neglected histories linked to African theory and models of disability when I was working with my colleagues from Zimbabwe - Dr. Tsitsi Chataika and the disabled disability rights activists Kudzai Shava and Abraham Mateta. We were collaborating on a book chapter for an edited collection entitled Advocacy in Conflict: Critical Perspectives on Transnational Advocacy.¹ As a group, we were trying to elucidate some of the transnational and national struggles we had seen in our own work in Sierra Leone and Zimbabwe around advocacy for disability rights. While we were writing together, my colleagues stated that they had an understanding of disability rights linked to South African understandings of Ubuntu. Ubuntu embodies a Southern African humanist and collective ethical philosophy. It states that our way of being human is connected to the humanness of other people. My colleagues also located this philosophy within their own histories of decolonisation and disability activism as a practice. I had come across the concept of ubuntu in terms of South African transitional justice and reconciliation but I had no idea what they meant when correlating it to ‘disability’ or ‘rights’.

In order to engage in a more respectful cross-cultural dialogue and collaboration, I thought I should learn about what ubuntu means philosophically, especially in terms of epistemology and ontology of disability.² An engagement with disability studies already requires concepts and frameworks that are relegated by mainstream academia. Additionally, there is also the work of understanding what decolonisation now implies and rethinking (dis)ableism through collaborative but accessible work. Thinking about why decolonisation has become so pertinent again, especially when it comes to Southern theory and the turn to the South,³ working through the real world implications of such ideas is usually where discourses around disability tend to stop and academics (usually working alone) cite ‘cultural model’. I think ‘culture’ now functions as a way to silence or put ‘disability‘ in particular academic boxes on paper. For instance, there is almost a tick-box way of writing anthropologically where you sprinkle your essay with some descriptive concepts, definitions of impairment or proverbs linked to disability and then call it ‘indigenous’ or ‘cultural’. I am guilty of this too. Yet, what is often referred to as ‘cultural’ is a specific way of presently being in the world that is informed by a past. Often those ‘cultural’ models also stop at our Western understandings of what ‘disability’ physically embodies because most of our work uses Western philosophy.

South African social rights activist and Anglican bishop Desmond Tutu explains Ubuntu (English).

Ubuntu is not a ‘cultural model’ but a social ethics which describes how a person is a person through their relationships with other people. I am through the humanness and diversity of the other. The expression people use in the South African Zulu language is akin to: I am because we are. In South Africa, what it means to be human and our relatedness to others also encompasses the spiritual relationships to the ancestors and land. The concept of diversity is thus wider than just biological and becomes correlated to relationship between the spiritual and ecological. This has repercussions for understanding impairment as not just biologically located but as cognitive, sensory, mental, physical and (eco) spiritual.

Yet, ubuntu is also a ‘normative claim’⁴ about how we should live and thus tells us something about the way in which disablement occurs because of lack of respect for the diversity of what it means to be human. Impairment can also be reactionary to a history of colonisation and violence. That’s why I think some of the most exciting work currently, especially using ethnographic methods, is being done by historians - almost excavating this history.⁵ Thus, in a second step, I wondered how you would view disability as linked to ubuntu in terms of restorative ethical practices to ensure the diversity of what means to be human. How did people understand a struggle for this shared humanity in terms of history of decolonisation? How does it link to history of activism in South Africa and other African countries? What is the link to the history of advocacy around disability? Do we have to think about ubuntu as an African model of disability?

Let’s be clear. I am not an activist either but I am interested in the sociology of disability and rights. The connections between the different theories or models and the practices they engender. During my PhD in sociology and social policy, I was very lucky that one of my supervisors was the British academic and disability activist Professor Colin Barnes, quite a few of my international colleagues who I studied with at the University of Leeds⁶ consider themselves activists and many of my research participants engage in advocacy around disability issues but don’t call themselves activists.

One of Colin Barnes’ heroes was Vic Finkelstein and so I read about his life history. That’s how I learned about the South African anti-apartheid connection to the origins of British activism around disability. I thus also started reading about differing forms of African activism. What’s nice about Vic Finkelstein’s work is that he doesn’t take ‘models’ too seriously⁷ and understands that they are linked to particular histories, people and places. For an activist like Finkelstein, you can call the model what you want, as long as it ensures future societal emancipation. His life and work in the diaspora also call into question how Western imaginaries construct notions such as ‘global south’ and ‘disability’. Thus working backwards, it makes sense to ask how and if our past societal emancipations or activisms are linked to particular African philosophies and how those affect models of disability.

Despite having undertaken such research to understand the importance of ubuntu to my colleagues, I had to write a paper about it in my spare time. More and more, the rigid rules of academia mean if you want to climb the career ladder, you are advised to stop publishing in places like African Journal of Disability and on topics that are marginalised. This is the complete opposite message you get within disability studies where increasing diversity, collaborating with your disabled colleagues, contributing to knowledge and ensuring accessibility of your research, especially in African context, is applauded. Moreover, researching and critically questioning why some theories and histories are being neglected is to be prioritised, especially if those insights come from people we work with. Those are also active processes of decolonisation that we need to engage in and shifts in our thinking about whose voices and perspectives matter.

Recommended Citation:
Maria Berghs (2017): Ubuntu and ways of being in the world: Listening to my colleagues describe Southern African disability history and theory. In: Public Disability History 2 (2017) 3.
Footnotes:
[1] Chataika, T., Berghs, M., Mateta, A. & Shava, K. 2015. ‘From whose perspective anyway? The quest for African disability rights activism’, in A. De Waal (ed.), Reclaiming activism: Western advocacy in contention, pp. 187–211, Zed Books, London.^↩
[2] Berghs, M. (2017). Practices and discourses of ubuntu: Implications for an African model of disability?. African Journal of Disability, 6, 8.^↩
[3] Comaroff, J., & Comaroff, J. L. (2015). Theory from the South: Or, how Euro-America is evolving toward Africa. London and New York: Routledge.^↩
[4] Van der Merwe, W.L. (1996) Philosophy and the multi-cultural context of (post) apartheid South Africa. Ethical Perspectives. 3(2): 1-15.^↩
[5] See: Hunt, N. R. (2015). A Nervous State: Violence, Remedies, and Reverie in Colonial Congo. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.^↩
[6] For example, that’s how I met Kudzai Shava.^↩
[7] Finkelstein, V. 1996. “Modelling Disability.” Available at: http://disability-studies.leeds.ac.uk/files/library/finkelstein-modelling-disability.pdf (Accessed on 21st February 2017) ^↩

Read More