THE FORMATION AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF DISABILITY STUDIES IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE 20th – BEGINNING OF THE 21st CENTURIES

Abstract

The article presents generalized theoretical and methodological developments in the field of non-normative corporeality, namely, its integral part – disability studies. The terminology system of this budding academic discipline is outlined through the prism of humanitarian knowledge and the possibility of its implementation in the newest Ukrainian literary criticism. Consequently, the purpose of this article is the analysis of the genesis of disability studies in the European and North American English-speaking spaces in the second half of the 20 th and the beginning of the 21 st centuries. The medical and social models of the perception of the sick Other from the historical and modern perspectives are systematized. The constructs of madness in the works by Michel Foucault, as well as the metaphors and myths of cancer, tuberculosis and AIDS in the works by Susan Sontag, are analyzed. The main concepts of disability worked out by European and North American scholars of the early 21 st century are mentioned. As a result, we can state the polyvalent nature of this concept. Highly specialized and universal definition or solution to the investigated problem is considered to be unproductive. Instead, it is advisable to use the synergetic approach. We emphasize the importance of further study of this multi-aspect phenomenon for the national scholarship due to obvious cultural, political, and social realities.