| Contents >Defining Disability Linguistically or How to obstruct someone with a dictionary by Belinda Downes ( University of Newcastle) |
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Level 2 - Stereotype: If you are young, you are either completely deaf or your hearing is okay (or useful).
This level of language is the one at which culture and familiarity with the subject, in this case disability, plays a large part. People may be aware of this level if the generally held stereotype flies in the face of their own personal experience. (In this case if they know someone well who is hard-of-hearing) Stereotypes are created and re-enforced by the factors we looked at above. These may be overt, for example Ian Dickinson's comment on Australian Idol to a contestant about her weight, or covert, as in many 'skin care' infomercials that medicalise perfectly normal biological functions such as light acne or uneven skin tone.
Stereotypes that refer specifically to disability nowadays tend to be covert - and are presented over a long time. One movie about an alien with an unusual facial structure is not going to institute a stereotype. However, if the only time a person sees a facial disability is either in a show about medical emergencies or as a marker of an alien character in a television program, the chances of forming an incorrect stereotype about the nature of facial disability and the personality attributes of people with uncommon facial structures is very high. As has been reported in the study so far, comments about - but not directed to - people with facial disabilities include references to aliens, ugliness and oddly enough, the singer Michael Jackson, whose alleged somewhat unusual personality traits are extended to other people with facial disability.
An example from The Late Show with David Letterman (July 1995 / CBS America) highlights this:
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Top Ten MTV Video Music Award Categories Michael Jackson is Nominated In
10. Best editing of facial features
9. Outstanding performance in ongoing police investigation
8. Weirdest male artist
7. Weirdest female artist
6. Best performance in a black and white video by artist who isn't really either
5. New video by guy with a brother named Tito
4. Best singer who talks just like Mike Tyson
3. Least life-like nose
2. Best acting in a marriage
1. Best new face
(Letterman 1995)
Publicly, celebrities like Michael Jackson tend to have a 'package' of attributes, the consequences of this for defining disability will be discussed in more detail later.
In our stereotype as presented above, hard-of-hearing, there are many competing and complicating factors. The first are stereotypes about youth equating to health, even down to ideas about personal music players damaging hearing when they are played too loud. Of course these ideas may be completely wrong in a given situation - young people can have only partial hearing that has absolutely nothing to do with loud music - but given that many stereotypes are covert and subtle, thinking past them can be difficult.
Level 3 - Personal Attitude (of speaker): People who ask me to use a pen and paper when they hear usefully are lazy.
This is related to the last level, in that personal experience plays a part, but differs in that this speaks more of the person's reaction to the stereotype. For instance: Does the person see the stereotype as dangerous? Danger is unfortunately a common stereotype of many mental illnesses.
In our case above the person has taken the stereotype, that young people are either deaf or have clear hearing, and taken that to mean that any young person who presents themselves as hard-of-hearing is lazy. Another example is Lupus where people have reported that others do not believe they are sick because they do not 'look' sick and are therefore (by their reasoning) lazy. (www.butyoudontlooksick.com lupus forums 2007)
Level 4 - Context: Someone needs information – but they are lazy. I’m going to be uncooperative, they should learn how to listen better if they can’t hear me.
These are the decisions made on a moment by moment, context by context basis, which can be inconsistent, and are for the most part just being human. The problem occurs in this case because of what has come before it and the personal circumstances of the one being asked for information.
This is also the level in which the attitude towards disability is expressed verbally, or in some cases overtly not expressed. In this case, unbeknown to the person with the hearing difficulty, the person they are trying to get information from has decided to be uncooperative. This could take many forms - from the point of view of the hard-of-hearing person - being ignored completely, having the person shout at them, reading an illegibly written note, to extremely uncomfortable situations like forcibly being taken somewhere else, (even if the other person means well), or being verbally abused.
What about the 'models'?
There are two generally accepted models within disability / special education to explain attitudes towards disability.
The Medical Model – The Medical model of disability is not so much a model, but an explanation of 'the bad old days' - talk / treat / fix the disability first, the person comes second. Expert, usually medical, driven solutions and language. Reaction to this model drives the 'terminology debate' which is a 'do not do this' debate. People who believe that the medical model is wrong may not know what to replace it with. It cannot inform what happens within conversations towards people with a disability.
The Social Model – Look at the person and the context first, handicap is due to social contexts. Ideally the person with the disability drives language and solutions to context problems. The Social model was to 'put the person first' when talking about disability, but in pragmatic terms seemed to only go as far as that. The idea of asking people with a disability how they would like to be referred to is not part of this model.
The Social model recognises that the Medical model has problems, but since the Medical model tended to institutionalise disability, the 'answer' tends to do the same. That is there are no personal consequences - it is whether your workplace has people with a disability in it, language terminology guidelines, ramps, or special toilets - the institution is responsible for removing the discrimination. (Marks, 1999)
As can be seen by the discussion above, talking about the models is useful, however they do not explain the internal linguistic conflict of speakers. It could be argued that the social model actually adds to the conflict, in that it makes people aware that something is wrong, but does not educate speakers about how to go about it. While the models acknowledge the contextual they do not acknowledge the personal conflict speakers can go through.
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| Contents >Defining Disability Linguistically or How to obstruct someone with a dictionary by Belinda Downes ( University of Newcastle) |