ERIC Number: EJ827305
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2009-Jan
Pages: 10
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0951-8398
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
Disability Images and the Art of Theorizing Normality
Titchkosky, Tanya
International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education (QSE), v22 n1 p75-84 Jan 2009
This paper addresses the power of images of disability as a way to examine how such images can be read as reproducing normality. By image of disability, I mean "any" appearance of disability made through the social act of interpretation. In this paper, I conduct an interpretive sociological analysis of common and even mundane everyday images of disability, including the universal icon for access. I aim to demonstrate the necessary "art" of theorizing the connection between images of disability and the reproduction of normality. I call this pursuit an "art" since through theorizing how and why disability appears as it does in everyday life we can "create" a livelier, provocative, and perhaps deliberately different image of disability. This paper, then, makes normality something to wonder about by theorizing familiar disability images that are already part of Western collective existence. (Contains 1 figure.)
Descriptors: Disabilities, Social Attitudes, Social Bias, Social Theories, Public Opinion, Cultural Influences, Human Body, Disability Discrimination, Imagination, Accessibility (for Disabled)
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 325 Chestnut Street Suite 800, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Fax: 215-625-2940; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A