Event promotes new approach to disability

Phi Betta Kappa visiting scholar Rosemarie Garland-Thompson spoke on disability awareness and inclusivity in upper Gorecki on March 21.

Garland-Thomson is a professor emerita of English and Bioethics at Emory University and an advocate for disability justice, leading the movement through a humanities-based approach. She is the co-editor of “About Us: Essays from the Disability Series of The New York Times by People with Disabilities” and the author of several other books.

“Disability is everywhere once you know how to find it. We’re going to be looking together tonight at finding disability,” Garland-Thomson said. “The human variations we think of as disabilities are part of the human condition that occur in every life and family and are a theme in all art and culture.”

The presentation started by defining disability through a non-medical perspective, focusing instead on the cultural, social, political and legal dimensions of the experience and identity of disability. She then discussed the cultural contributions of people with disabilities, explained the connection between the evolution of the disability rights movement and the broader civil rights movements, and concluded with a discussion on opportunities for increasing accessibility in the world. A question and answer portion with the audience followed the presentation.

In order to create an event which was accessible in itself, all participants used a microphone while speaking. Garland-Thomson used slides with text summarizing her points.

As an English professor, Garland-Thomson is particularly interested in studying narratives and stories. She said themes of disability are found in literature, performance, art and design.

“Disability is productive, it is generative,” she said.

She gave examples of traditional and contemporary creative people from various art forms and genres who identify as having a disability, such as musicians Beethoven and Stevie Wonder, actor Peter Dinklage, poet and dancer Leroy Moore and artists Frida Kahlo, Claude Monet and Judith Scott.

Garland-Thomson explained how these individuals’ disabilities are not barriers to overcome in their creative process, but central to their unique perspective, similar to other social identities. Her inquiry into how disability is defined was central to the presentation.

“It was really interesting to attend an event that talked about disability in a way that made it more apparent that this is not a problem that has already been solved, and that it’s not necessarily even a problem in and of itself. It’s just [gaining] an awareness that [disability] isn’t something that needs to be covered up,” said Ella Martin, CSB first-year.

Garland-Thomson said that it is also important to consider how we discover access in a world created and used communally. Her presentation discussed examples of access which most people are already familiar with such as the wheelchair symbol for disability parking or academic accommodation programs.

“I have suggested to you that disability is everywhere once we know how to look for it and find it, and now I want to say that access is everywhere once we know how to look for it and find it,” Garland-Thomson said.

According to Garland-Thomson, these movements for access came out of the broader movement for civil rights in the mid-20th century. Protests for accessibility were tied very closely to the Black civil rights movement and the women’s movement. Garland-Thomson says that intersectionality, fighting for the liberation of all marginalized identities, is the key to the most equitable movements.

She said that legislation such as the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 is a result of the transition of people with disabilities being seen as citizens with agency rather than patients, which emerged from this movement. However, the political definition of disability is only one definition, she pointed out.

“Disabled people…are a politically created group of qualified individuals…protected against discrimination by civil right legislation…and accorded the right to request reasonable accommodations,” Garland-Thomson said. “You have to qualify to…request accommodations or to be recognized as a person with a disability, which is interesting because with other identity categories, you don’t have to qualify.”

Garland-Thomson said that it is important for all people to be aware of what accommodations and technological assistance exist in general and within specific communities in order to advocate for the needs of people with disabilities around them. Additionally, because disability is an experience which many people transition in and out of throughout their lifetime, she says that anyone may require accommodations themself at some point.

According to Garland-Thomson, intentionally accessible spaces are important because of how they define who is allowed to be together in a community.

Toward the end of the presentation, she listed a few other areas for increasing disability inclusion including education, knowledge of technology and accommodations, advocating for accessibility in the workplace and supporting inclusive communities and organizations.

“One thing I learned was that I really want to try to have a better mindset about accessibility in our schools. I think there are a lot of things that I’ve never really looked at within our campuses,” Martin said. “Is this really accessible for everyone or is it just something that is benefitting me and other people who are temporarily able-bodied?”