dis/lit 21

Lanie, Lu, Shane, and Haley

• When someone is disabled, their future is actually decided for them
• Disabled people do not get a lot of say in what they want
• Instead of wanting to do best for disabled people, non-disabled people want to do what would make their own lives easier 
• “Your disability is causing ME all these problems”
• It is like they are punishing people for having a disability
• Forced assimilation 
• Prosthetics are used for cosmetic purposes instead of actual aid as a way to conform 
• People with cochlear implants are treated poorly within the deaf and hearing communities because deaf communities say they are basically hearing, but hearing people do not consider them to be same as them
• Children with Deaf/HOH say they are aligned with deaf community and there’s debates on if that is okay or not
• Parents of disabled children want to be rewarded for being parents of disabled children because they see disability as a bad thing
• Parents/non-disabled people make it all about themselves instead of asking what disabled people want

Bibi’s story is deeply disturbing for a number of reasons, but what stands out the most to me is the “cure” proposed for Bibi and the assumption of female hysteria. Bibi’s life long battle with epilepsy was assumed to be cured by a man, and to put it quite literally, sex with a man. Yes, this is something Bibi wanted, to be recognized as a “true woman” and find a husband to be married, but the placement of that as her only hope is really disturbing. Bibi goes through this entire story. carefully monitored, watched, and even assisted by the other women, who try to make her feel as if she is able to be “one of them” despite the stigma and assumptions made about her condition. It’s only when Bibi finds a man and becomes pregnant that she is truly left alone, for months. This places Bibi in a place of isolation, worse than the one she was previously experiencing.

The rejection caused by Bibi’s epilepsy is one that is publicly recognized. This places Bibi’s pregnancy at even more of a shock, but Bibi allows that man to keep his secrets and not be known as someone who “dirtied” her or interacted with her in such an intimate way at all. Instead, she gives him the “privacy” that she herself was never afforded and continues to have to live a life of exile, despite her desire to be a mother finally being fulfilled.

Group Members: Elena, Lu, Keona, Katie, Sonia

Elena: Models erase experiences
Sonia: Models create limits, boxes someone in
Keona: No one lived experience, any category creates limits
Elena: relation to Language and Gender
Katie: Limiting potential
Katie: No one experience is the same and that discredits models
Lu: social model doesn’t put the blame on disabled, but they can apply it to any person, which can be harmful. Some things are reserved for certain groups (CODA example). Self-ableism
Elena: education is privilege, higher chance of lack of access if in oppressed group, relates back to shaving legs
Sonia: Ease of discrimination (not putting in a ramp example), pretty scary how subtle discrimination can be
Katie: Awareness increased by this class
Lu: gov’t determines who gets benefits, great controversy because of that, article sent about abortions and down syndrome
Sonia: ties into imagined futures, making the decision for the child
Elena: lack of autonomy, multitude of reasons for abortion after finding out child has autism, chronic illness and pain don’t like model of disability b/c it erases their experience. All ties into capitalism!!
Lu: we can’t define things for other people– imagined futures, no one asks how disabled person feels about decisions
Sonia: cure or kill is back
Elena: placing worth of disabled people on their cost of existing, think about people in relation to abled lives
Katie: base disabled lives off the lives of abled people, very corrupt
Elena: bring it back to capitalism, rise of communes on TikTok (community that is egalitarian is ableist fantasy, disabled people can’t perform physical labor, which is how that society works)

TKAM
Elena: Underwood editorial and the premise of not shooting mockingbirds, similar as men saying “I would never hit a woman”, doesn’t make me feel empowered, preventing violence against women but still misguided
Sonia: relates back to “I didn’t know it was ableist”, doesn’t actually help the issue because there’s no action taken, what are you doing about that?
Elena: “band-aid fixes”, saying you’re not one way or wouldn’t do something actually addresses the issue but still comes from place that creates the issue, a lot of people don’t know what it’s like to be disabled, still others people

Sonia: blaming Tom Robinson for his death b/c of his disability, instead of the people who shot him
Elena: erases experience of disability, chances of dying would have been similar w/ escape, circumstances are dire
Katie: 17 shots was way more than needed
Elena: relates to shooting of black people, excessive shots, clearly because of racism
Keona: agrees with that, all intersections play a part in discrimination

Alaina Taylor (Writer), Faith Hopkins (F), Lily Sportsman (L), and Arden Jones (A)

F: Points out that how there was a lot of disability that occurred on plantations that were never recorded, or if they were they were recorded by white men, so they could have altered it, making it less severe than it possibly could have, made or it more intellectual disability 

L: Accounts were definitely whitewashed, a lot of the disabilities could have been caused by someone who was white, physical, and mental. PTSD. It is easy to make the assumptions that the accounts were whitewashed

A: During that time slaves were not taught to read or write, so they could have been taken advantage of. 

L: Slaveowners might have been ashamed of their slaves’ disability

Lanie: Wilson in the reading was maimed by the slave owners to where he lost strength in his arm.

L: They could have overlooked disability because the slaves would be seen as less valuable 

A: Disability among slaves was considered normal because they were already considered lesser than, so already disabled

F: Sambose: what does it mean. Trauma shock and created the sambos effect. Causes mental trauma 

Dr. F: 

A: Makes a connection to what occurred during the holocaust 

F: Sambose was a justification for slavery, that slaves needed ‘guidance from white slave owners, because of the belief of degraded mentality 

A: Slaveowners needed to have a way to be self-justifying.  

A: Makes a connection to of Mice and Men with lenny being threatened over the wife 

F: Makes a connection to To kill a mockingbird and to Tom Robinson and the racial divide between people of color and white folks. 

A: They were frustrated with the trial result, the results made them angry because the racist jury went against Robinson even though Atticus had a good argument that should have won. 

F: Didn’t think about why they were guilty at first, not under later when she is rereading it does she get that the jury was racist. 

Round 2

F: Points out the passage, ” Some people are born gifted…” she likes it because not everyone is created equal, we are all different. Some of us need more support while some do not need any. It makes a lot of sense that all men are created equal in the courtroom, but nowhere else

A: We all wish we lived in a world where we are all treated nicely. Agrees with Faith on how honest the reality of things and that it is not sugar-coated. 

F: This goes to show what Atticus is trying to accomplish. Tom is not treated as equally as others, both because of race and because of his physical disability. 

Lanie: Points out the fact that the kids were sitting up in the colored section, breaking boundaries, 

F: Agrees

A: Didn’t like the fact people gave up the fact that people gave up their seats. Racism is taught. Talks about how Jem wanted Atticus to win. They wanted to have a good ending. 

F: Likes how the book shows the hard truth about racism. It is a good idea to read the book to show how racism is and was. That racism exists and should be talked about 

A: Struck a chord because their mom is someone who works in the court that protects people of color or disability, It hit a personal chord. 

Lanie: He just wanted to help the girl he was accused of raping. 

A: Makes a connection to Lennie and curlys wife. How she used her status to threaten those around her. 

F: Does this happen now?

A and Lanie: Yep

A: Atticus’s speech brings light to how the world is still racist and bad things occur. 

F: In the courtroom, these things need to be pushed aside and people need to be treated equally 

A: Yes, don’t use differences to advantage

F: Points out how bias the jury was 

Dr. F: Voter suppression was not a thing then, and it was not a surprise that there was no one of color on the jury

Hannah Foleck (writer) , Emily Kile, Lauren Reiff, Katherine Blair

L: Connection with Tom Robinson, with arm and the systematic institutionalized racism, especially in the court case. We associate doctors with healers so when we see doctors being evil there is a break where people find it hard to believe. We want to trust our doctors but when it comes to racism or disability there can be lying. There were experiments done on slaves like the nazi experiments

K: the sanbow stereotype, trauma of capture shock and resistance led to the degraded mental state of slaves. Learning about the history of slavery we learned about the poor treatment, but we often gloss over the mental trauma

L: people who kept slaves used the mental trauma as a confirmation bias, when the phys issues emerge from the abuse and rape, they would use this as a reason to keep slaves because they are incapable of taking care of themselves.

H: This would give them a reason to do experiments on other people such as slaves or people with disabilities  

L: comparison to nazis in the way that there are experiments done on people because they are viewed as less than

E: slavery and insitutionalization of people with disabilities and the experimentation is all rooted in taking away the agency of people with their own bodies

L: when someone fought back against the experimenters they would physically disable them to keep them docile for the experiments so they couldn’t fight back.  

E: nazis experiments was rooted in the american eugenics experiments, many of these theories came from america

L: medical records were kept incredible, eugenics was viewed as a very respected field

H: They did not see people who were different to them as real people which allowed them to do these experiments and treat them worse without feeling badly about it

P: connections between eudenicists vs societal impules, slavery compared to the holocaust 

L: “white medicine” vs “black medicine”, viewed as not even human, as though their bodies would not respond the same way with the same medicines. Afircan american people being responsible for their own medicines and not even being treated. 

K: mixed children not truly belonging anywhere, not one really wants them because they don’t belong to the black people or the white people

H: the dad having to pretend he is a drunk in order to be accepted for having mixed children

K: a black person is the same as any person all people lie and there are always bad people, essentially separating him from everyone else

L: Toms hand, the disability emerged from working conditions gives people a reason to separate him even further

K: using his disability as a valid point as to why he couldn’t have done it, and people dismissing the only piece of valid evidence. Interesting how Tom explained his story, May made the first move on him so she had to respond in this extreme way, by accusing him and her entire testimony was made up of lies. 

H: once they started this lie they couldn’t back down, they needed everyone to believe them otherwise they become even less than they already were. There is a sense of shame that comes from being interested in a person of color or someone who is different from you.

• Daniel Huffman (DH), Elena Marshel (EM), Eliana Black (EB), Kim Eastridge (KE, note taker)
  • EM: liked the varied perspectives; related to our reading, to kill a mockingbird; the way that Mayella used Tom Robinson to do physical labor and to sexualize 
  • KE: historical background; hypersexuality of black men and women; historical cases of sexual assault between black men and white women; even with consensual relationships
  • EM: still commodifying black bodies but under the guise of empowerment; with black women in media
  • DH: fetishizing bodies and communities; plus size models, trans people, POC; colorism, there is exceptions to what people “are into”
  • EM: how we view sexuality; people’s attractiveness is inherent to their value
  • KE: connection of Tom Robinson’s injury to enslavement/sharecropping that is discussed in Boster’s introduction
  • EB: hyper-sexualization has been normalized in society as “that’s just my type”; still applicable today
  • EM: connected to dehumanizing the oppressed group
  • KE: with Tom Robinson saying he felt sorry for Mayella was seen as wrong because black people “weren’t allowed to feel pity for white people”
  • EM: excited to finish the book; Tom Robinson inadvertently came across as too human by saying he felt pity; would put him morally above white people which was not allowed
  • KE: Boster’s disabled versus handicap; if society was completely accessible, there would be no “dis” in front of it. Most likely won’t happen in society during our lifetimes, but the idea of having a fully accessible world is fascinating
  • EM: heard of it before but was kind of against it, but reading Boster’s piece swayed their mind; disabilities goes beyond physical barricades 
  • DH: we should look at it as too different focuses; handicap vs. disabled; umbrella terms are important but the individual differences and issues should not be neglected 
  • EM: line you have to walk; having too many terms versus overgeneralizing
  • EB: difference between changing how society sees it versus grouping people together under similarities; differences need to be acknowledge and accessible; almost undermining it
  • EM: risk ignoring the struggles that it causes

In “Here Are The Marks Yet” Dea H. Boster examines the intersection of African American history and disability, particularly during the period of slavery. She argues the benefits of viewing disability as a social construct rather than a physical or psychological condition. Originally, I did not agree with this approach because I believe in order to accommodate people with disabilities we have to recognize their individual needs (for example ensuring a blind person has access to braille.) However, as I read deeper into the text I found myself understanding her point of view. Boster argues the benefits of differentiating between disability and handicaps, asserting disability goes beyond physical or psychological impairments. The root of disability is not solely a person’s condition rather a combination of personal experiences, cultural assumptions and the reaction to those conditions. She examines several examples that support this claim throughout her introduction, especially in regards to the treatment of enslaved people. She opens with an example of a former slave, Tom Wilson who endured beatings, being shot, attacked by dogs and had is arm mutilated to decrease his ability to defend himself. The fact his disabilities emerged from the living and working conditions forced upon him provides insight to the intersection of slavery and disability and the benefits of examining disability in the context of life experience. Boster notes how the concept of health during the Antebellum period differed between white people and black people. The concept of what made an African American person healthy was not just an assessment of their physical and mental health, rather depended heavily on how much they would sell for at a slave market. This belief was deeply engrained into society, transcending the grounds of plantations and the minds of just slave owners. Due to assumption that African Americans were inherently mentally inferior, psychological disabilities were not taken seriously. Rather, African Americans with psychological disabilities were used as conformation bias by southern society to continue the practice of slavery, even if their condition emerged from the working and living conditions an enslaved person was force to endure. I have a natural inclination to associate doctors as healers or “good people.” This view was challenged as Boster discussed the difficulties she faced when researching for her writing. She notes the institutionalized racism in medical records she came across when attempting to assess the relationship between slavery and disability. Due to the fact slaves were treated as property as apposed to people, there is a lack of traditional medical records documenting disability. A good deal of her primary sources accessing disability were obtained from bills of sale, records of labor loss resulting from condition, and medical journals from forced human experimentation. Although I was initially hesitant to agree with Boster’s assertion disability is a social construct, by the end I thought she made valid points I found myself agreeing with. There is clear connection to how disability in African American people was a result of societal expectations.