Provocations for Critical Disability Studies

Dan Goodley,Rebecca Lawthom,Kirsty Liddiard,Katherine Runswick-Cole

doi:10.1080/09687599.2019.1566889

Dan Goodley, Rebecca Lawthom + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1080/09687599.2019.1566889

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Abstract

This article posits a number of provocations for scholars and researchers engaged with Critical Disability Studies. We summarise some of the analytical twists and turns occurring over the last few years that create a number of questions and concerns. We begin by introducing Critical Disability Studies; describing it as an interdisciplinary field of scholarship building on foundational disability studies theories. Critical Disability Studies scholarship is being produced at an exponential rate and we assert that we need to take pause for thought. We lay out five provocations to encourage reflection and debate: what is the purpose of Critical Disability Studies; how inclusive is Critical Disability Studies; is disability the object or subject of studies; what matters or gets said about disability; and how can we attend to disability and ability? We conclude by making a case for a reflexive and politicised Critical Disability Studies.

Highlights

To contemplate disability is to consider a politicised phenomenon framed by precarity, crisis and uncertainty (Jones 2018)
We suggest that Critical Disability Studies engage with the relative relevance, purpose, focus and alliance of a number of significant theoretical interventions with an overriding aim in mind: to simultaneously theorise and contest the conditions of disablism and ableism
One of the early leitmotifs of emerging Critical Disability Studies scholarship was an attitude of tolerance to divergent viewpoints and clashing perspectives

Summary

Introduction

To contemplate disability is to consider a politicised phenomenon framed by precarity, crisis and uncertainty (Jones 2018). Of the one billion disabled people across the globe, most live in the majority world (World Health Organization and The World Bank 2011). Disabled people’s organisations posit a simple but powerful idea: disability is a phenomenon associated with the discrimination of people with sensory, physical and cognitive impairments (Oliver and Barnes 2012). Disability is a matter of public discourse and international disgrace, exemplified in the continued exclusion of impaired children from mainstream schools (Slee 2018), the segregation of disabled adults from employment contexts (Beyer et al 2016) and the denial of access to basic human rights as a consequence of reducing welfare and essential services (World Health Organization and The World Bank 2011). It could be argued that research and theory on disability have never been more needed

Objectives

Conclusion