Becoming rhizomatic parents: Deleuze, Guattari and disabled babies

In order for the sociological study of disability to enable, then it must be ready to conceptualize complex terrains of knowledge and activism. Research has to work alongside disabled people, their allies, their practices, their resistances and their theorizing. This paper makes a case for a framework of understanding that situates such work. Disability studies tends to understand its concepts (e.g. disability, exclusion, inclusion, impairment, politicization, people) as entities rooted in arborescent and hierarchical forms of knowledge. These modernist misconceptions can be challenged through understanding knowledge, practice, living and activism as rhizomatic, captured as lines of flight which are always becoming. As a new reader of Deleuze and Guattari, I make a case for disability research understanding parents and their disabled children as deconstructing or (re)deterritorializing the areas of policy, politics, practice, theory and activism. Creating burrows for shelter and eventual breakout, becoming 'angel makers', drawing on narratives of parents of disabled babies, this paper maps out a vision of parents not blocked by the strata of disabling society, but enabled by lines of flight, resistance, flux and change. This paper aims to be Deleuzoguattarian but only in ways that fit the complexities of parents' accounts.     

Feeling disability: theories of affect and critical disability studies

This paper explores connections between affect studies and critical disability studies. Our interest in affect is sparked by the beginnings of a new research project that seeks to illuminate the lives, hopes and desires of young people with ‘life-limiting’ or ‘life-threatening’ impairments. Cultural responses to these young people are shaped by dominant discourses associated with lives lived well and long. Before commencing our empirical work with young people we use this paper to think through how we might conceptualise affect and disability. We present three themes; ontological invalidation in neoliberal-able times; affect aliens and crip killjoys; disability and resistant assemblages.     

Dis/entangling critical disability studies

Recently there has been discussion about the emergence of critical disability studies. In this paper I provide an inevitably partial and selective account of this trans-disciplinary space through reference to a number of emerging insights, including theorizing through materialism, bodies that matter, inter/trans-sectionality, global disability studies, and self and Other. I briefly disentangle these themes and suggest that while we may well start with disability, we often never end with it as we engage with other transformative arenas including feminist, critical race and queer theories. Yet critical disability studies reminds us of the centrality of disability when we consider the politics of life itself. In this sense, then, disability becomes entangled with other forms of oppression and revolutionary responses.     

Epistemological journeys in participatory action research: alliances between community psychology and disability studies

This paper seeks to explore emancipatory disability research possibilities through the use of participatory action research and the cross-fertilisation of ideas between British disability studies (DS) and community psychology (CP). First, we consider the psychology in CP and suggest that it is far removed from mainstream psychology's pathological vision of disabled people. Second, we draw on Burrell and Morgan's (1979) model of paradigms to interrogate research practice in DS and CP. Third, we compare and contrast research narratives from DS and CP through reference to some examples of our own research. We argue that CP pays particular attention to the development of community selves and cultural identities within the participatory action research process: which we feel to be a key concern for the development of an emancipatory DS. We conclude that recognising the radical humanist element of participatory action research (PAR) permits us to navigate an enabling journey for disability research.     

In defence of disability studies: a response to Forshaw (2007) 'In defence of psychology: a reply to Goodley and Lawthom (2005)'

We welcome Forshaw's reply to our paper because it opens up debate about psychology and its relationship with the development of an emancipatory disability studies. In our paper we aimed to: (1) raise possibilities for disability studies researchers' engagement with psychology (rather than psychology colonizing disability studies); (2) trace some of the epistemological journeys we underwent in carrying out disability research and community psychology research; (3) consider these possibilities and journeys in relation to previous literature on emancipatory disability research. Forshaw's reply appears to ignore aims (2) and (3) and instead focuses on the ways in which we (mis)represent psychology. He suggests that we: present an inaccurate account of qualitative research in contemporary psychology; make a divisive argument for a 'breakaway group' of community psychologists; epistemologically contradict ourselves because of our concern with 'reality' and social constructionism; argue for only adopting participatory action research; not least, adopt 'simplistic' and 'outdated' views of psychology. We will respond to these criticisms.     

DisPovertyPorn: Benefits Street and the dis/ability paradox

In this article, we offer a timely socio-cultural analysis, informed by a critical disability perspective, of UK Channel 4’s reality television series Benefits Street. Drawing on the work of Allen, Tyler, and De Benedictus and Jensen on ‘poverty porn’, we broaden their analysis to ask how dis/ability disrupts the ‘poverty porn’ narrative. We pay attention to the dis/appearance of dis/ability on Benefits Street and, in doing so, we also extend an analysis of how impairment labels function in people’s lives as socio-cultural categories that place limits on what labelled people can do and can be. We suggest that both the articulation and erasure of dis/ability are used as a form of narrative prosthesis to support the overarching story line that people on benefits are unworthy ‘scroungers’.     

'Learning Difficulties', the Social Model of Disability and Impairment: Challenging epistemologies

Critical researchers enter into an investigation with their assumptions on the table, so no one is confused concerning the epistemological and political baggage they bring with them to the research site (Kincheloe & McLaren, 1998, p. 265). A theory of disability as oppression recognises and, in the present context, emphasies the social origins of impairment. (Abberley, 1987, in Barton and Oliver, 1997, p176, my emphasis.) Identification with the label of 'learning difficulties' has contradictory personal and political implications for people so-labelled. While this identification has allowed people to organise collectively through the self-advocacy movement, pervasive understandings of 'learning difficulties' that permeate many societal settings tend to be framed in ways that directly confirm a personal tragedy model of disability and impairment. This paper argues for a reconsideration of impairment in relation to 'learning difficulties', to challenge pervasive assumptions in relation to 'learning difficulties' - at the level of epistemology - and to construct four inclusive epistemological foundations . The first, deconstructing impairment , draws upon a body of literature that has exposed the social nature of diagnostic criteria and destabilised naturalised notions of 'learning difficulties'. The second, impairment, as storied , brings in the accounts of people with 'learning difficulties' that locate impairment in, and as, personal and social narratives. Thirdly, reculturising impairment highlights emergent resilient cultures of people with 'learning difficulties' that re-culturise impairment. Fourthly, epistemological impacts , grounds the analysis by calling for an attention to the ways in which assumptions about the origins of 'learning difficulties' impact upon the treatment of people so-labelled.     

Doing Disability Research: activist lives and the academy

The relationship between the academy and the disability movement is a problematic one. Disability researchers based in the academic world who align themselves with the social model of disability face contradictory aims and values in attempting to challenge dominant modes of research production in ways that signify the importance of the agendas of disabled people. It could be argued that research that involves people with the label of 'learning difficulties' [1] creates further points of contention. In this paper we do two things. First, we re-present a paper given at a conference on the performing arts of people with 'learning difficulties', where the audience was made up of performers, workers, providers and researchers. This paper attempted to be accessible, theoretical, political and practical. Secondly, we reflect upon this paper in relation to seven points of analysis that emerge at the boundaries of disability politics and disability research. We argue throughout that real efforts must be made to bridge these boundaries in ways that augment disability theory and politics together.     

Provocations for Critical Disability Studies

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.