Session Information
23 SES 01 C, Politics of Equity and Inclusion
Paper Session
Time:
2010-08-25
09:15-10:45
Room:
M.B. SALI 7, Päärakennus / Main Building
Chair:
Anja Sinikka Heikkinen
Contribution
In this presentation the methodology used by contemporary disability historians in their quest for the revelation of lost voices and suppressed experiences of persons with disabilities critically is examined and confronted with recent insights of postmodern theories. These troubling insights to a large extent have rendered the use of identity politics in emancipatory processes of persons with disabilities problematic. At the heart of these disturbing insights lies the frequently used description of emancipation as a movement from the realm of shadows towards the light. Inspired by the work of the German philosopher Walter Benjamin – especially his text ‘On the concept of history’ (1940) – and applied to the political aspirations of many of the existing disability histories we would like to suggest that the relationship between emancipation and the realm of shadows not necessarily has to be conceived in negative terms. After having shown that history itself can be seen as a collection of shadows brought about by the activity of the historian, the metaphor of the shadow at the same time enables us to restrain ourselves from embracing a historicist position – namely the belief that it would be possible to reveal how things, events or persons really were in the past – and a representation of history in terms of linear progress. This postmodern approach of history, however, not necessarily has to end up – as frequently is argued by disability scholars – in the annihilation of the political struggles instigated by e.g. disability rights movements around the globe. On the contrary, thinking about doing disability history and emancipation as vital activities which take place in and throughout the shadows actually results in an enlargement of the critical gaze of disability historians towards contemporary political processes, collective aspirations and personal wishes.
Method
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Expected Outcomes
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References
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