Press Terminology and Disablism

Published May 11, 2009 @ 04:00PM PT

A news report on a students with disabilities panel at Ohio State gives small samples from two students who use wheelchairs, a deaf student, a student who has Asperger's, a blind student, and a student who has dyslexia. It was a bit hard to tell if the story was annoying and disablist (e.g., "confined to a wheelchair," "in spite of daily obstacles") or empowering and educational (e.g., "I wouldn't be who I am today if I wasn't dyslexic. I would be a totally different person and I don't want to be a different person. I like who I am").

Given that the disablist bits don't come from the student quotes but from the rest of the text, perhaps this is more an artifact of the person who wrote the story than the actual panel having been in the category of "self-narrating zoo exhibit" or "super crip" or worse.

The disability panel article is no where near as bad as some of the horrific verbiage describing people with mental illness discussed in a recent UPI article, but it's really the same problem.

Popular media--the press, television, movies, all of it--needs a better education on how to respectfully talk with and about people with disabilities. Perhaps exactly as suggested in this excellent piece on avoiding disability stereotypes in journalism from the Indiana School of Journalism.

(Side note: Cody Boisclair wrote to the Guardian (see comments), requesting that they comply with their own disability policy and remove the word "suffering" from their recent autism and girls headline. Guardian changed the headline right away--Kudos to both Cody and the Guardian!)

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Comments (9)

Just a correction-- you misspelled my last name. Not a huge issue, because I think I've seen it misspelled more often than I've seen it spelled correctly. :)

Posted by Cody Boisclair on 05/11/2009 @ 07:36PM PT
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Fixed, sorry aobut that. Thanks for telling me. I really do know how to spell it my eyes just slipped over the typo a million times.

Posted by Dora Raymaker on 05/11/2009 @ 07:47PM PT
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@Kristina. "Popular media--the press, television, movies, all of it--needs a better education on how to respectfully talk with and about people with disabilities". Thanks for writing this blog. I think you make some important points.

I really like your comment. I think most people are in need of an education on disabilities. Attitudes have changed in the last 10 years.

Autistic adults are becoming empowered. Disabilities are seen in a more positive light. There is a generation gap in thinking about autism. There are children and adult autistics/ low and high functioning. There are people saying, "Don't speak for my kid".

We need to learn how to respectfully talk with/about disabilities with each other. I repeat it again because the comment is very important. What kinds of topics should be included in a respectful education dialogue?

Posted by L I on 05/11/2009 @ 11:32PM PT
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Hi this is a dorapost--not sure if Kristina monitors the comments on my posts, so you may want to repost your question on one of her posts.

Posted by Dora Raymaker on 05/11/2009 @ 11:49PM PT
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Sorry, I should have written Dora's name (not Kristina's name) for the reply. I was tired when I wrote this last night-a glitch of sorts.

Posted by L I on 05/12/2009 @ 10:35AM PT
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I don't mind no need for sorry--I just didn't want you to be wondering why Kristina didn't answer your questions to her :-)

Posted by Dora Raymaker on 05/12/2009 @ 10:47AM PT
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There are disabled students at my Uni too.

We are planning campaigns on access, we do not exist to be patronised and patted on the back, we are there to study, and the obstacles are not the ones that arise naturally from our respective differences.

Posted by Laurentius Rex on 05/12/2009 @ 02:04AM PT
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Thanks for posting this. I'm an Ohio State student, and I'm friends with the Asperger's panelist. When I first read this story in our campus newspaper, I wasn't sure how to react, exactly. As you've mentioned, there seems to be a genre mix going on, a cross between (dis)ableist sentiment and educational tidbits. My sense is that the writer has injected her own thoughts and biases into the narrative. I highly doubt the panelists thought/think of themselves as supercripped, impaired, confined, plucky, etc.

Strangely, I was invited to join this panel along with Benzion, but I never responded to the email. I'm sort of leery of these things. I feel as though things can get twisted, misunderstood, or misrepresented really easily. Also, the invite was posed in such a way that it suggested I would be expected to "share my challenges." There were two ways to interpret this, one worse than the other: 1) I could share the challenges I face from societal forces, that is, lack of access and support, discrimination, impatience, and so forth, or 2) discuss my autistic oddities and let everyone feel good that they're not like me.

Thankfully, Ben is quite an articulate person. The times I've heard him speak, I've been blown away by his precision, as well as his forthrightness. Me, I can write up a storm, but when it comes to public speaking (especially navigating a panel discussion), I often flounder.

Posted by Melanie Yergeau on 05/15/2009 @ 02:00PM PT
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Thanks for your comment, I really appreciate it. It's always best to have more of a real first person account, IMO. I agree that things get twisted really easily; I'm always wondering what really went on--as opposed to what the article I just read told me went on.

Posted by Dora Raymaker on 05/15/2009 @ 02:06PM PT
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Dora is committed to improving quality of life for individuals on the autistic spectrum--including herself! She is Co-director of the Academic Autistic Spectrum Partnership in Research and Education and a member of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network's Board of Directors.