Comment from the Field: The Voice of Disability, Seminar Series, Centre for Culture and Disability Studies, Liverpool Hope University

The third and final instalment in the Voice of Disability seminar series was held at Liverpool Hope University between January and July 2016. Organizing and chairing this series, Dr David Bolt, Director of the Centre for Culture and Disability Studies (CCDS),¹ introduced attendees to a selection of speakers who explored how the voice of disability is conveyed through theory, representation, aesthetics, and narrative.

The first speaker in this part of the series was Alan Hodkinson (Liverpool Hope University), who delivered his paper “The Unseeing Eye: Disability and the Hauntology of Derrida’s Ghost. A Story in Three Parts.” Employing the three stanzas of Thomas Hardy’s poem “The Self-Unseeing,” Dr Hodkinson discussed the “conspiracy of normalcy” that exists in the cultural artefacts which reside in English schools, emphasizing how this conspiracy has contributed to the rueful erasure “of the strong and proud history of disabled people.” Seeking to reclaim this history and thus to rewrite the present and future of education in England, Dr Hodkinson drew on the theoretical works of Derrida and Bentham. He concluded his seminar by revealing how a “utopia of hope” can be found in the “real” story of disability that, when materialized, is powerful enough to disassemble “Their transparent house” of normalcy.

“Two Voices and Disability: A Voice of Inscription and a Voice of Re-Constitution” saw Tom Campbell (University of Leeds) explore how categories are invented to describe particular traits that become “visualized at particular historical points.” Providing an example of this construction, Dr Campbell emphasized how the impairment category dyslexia only becomes visible when society places value on a standardized form of literacy. Using Foucault’s work on genealogy and biopolitics, Dr Campbell voiced concern with how impairment categories are constituted by experts, revealing that although fruitful these categories are also inherently dangerous. This double-edged sword is demonstrated by the fact that impairment categories, while providing access to support and a unification of people, simultaneously operate on a level of (self-)reparation to ensure that the interests of capitalism are served. Progression, Dr Campbell argued, involves reconstituting the voice of disability by investigating the categories that disabled people use to define themselves.

In her seminar “Unexpected Anatomies: Extraordinary Bodies in Contemporary Art,” Ann M. Fox (Davidson College) used the medium of aesthetics to demonstrate how the voice of disability “works to dismantle the hierarchy that presumes the inherent superiority of normalcy.” With an emphasis on the politics of staring, Prof. Fox drew on her experience as a co-curator of three disability arts-related exhibitions, to introduce and narrate various forms of art. Diverting attendees away from preconceived ideas of the disabled body, she encouraged a consideration of an “expansive imagination of the body.” This visualization of the body in contemporary disability art, Prof. Fox explained, foregrounds disability as a “creative and regenerative force.” In this instance, disability can be appreciated for the “new ways of knowing” that it brings.

Following Prof. Fox’s seminar, there were two seminars scheduled that unfortunately had to be cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances. “‘The President has been shot’: Reagan, Wounded Heroes and the Cyborg Soldier in American Science Fiction of the 1980s” was to be presented by Sue Smith (independent scholar). In this paper, Dr Smith was planning to discuss President Ronald Reagan, disability, and the cyborg soldier in 1980s American science fiction. The Warrior’s Apprentice (1986), a space opera novel by Lois McMaster Bujold, was to form the focus of this discussion. The seminar that was due to be presented by Alan Gregory (Lancaster University) was entitled “Tales from the Crip: Narrative Reconstructions of the Storyteller’s Disabled Male Body in Contemporary Gothic Fiction.” As the title suggests, in this paper Dr Gregory intended to explore the representation of disabled men in contemporary Gothic texts—namely, Geek Love (1989) by Katherine Dunn, The Giant O’Brien (1998) by Hilary Mantel, and Martha Peake (2000) by Patrick McGrath.

Concluding the Voice of Disability seminar series, Laura Waite (Liverpool Hope University) delivered her paper entitled “Voices of Becoming...