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Chapter Ten The Dilemma ofAssociation among Blind People One of the virtually universal features of culture is the conceptualizing of people into stratified categories. A common and extreme form of this is the subjection of people in inferior social categories to diffuse discredit, or stigma. The latter entails a continuum of practices , from mild discrimination to radical exclusion and persecution. Mainline sociology has shed much light on one particular aspect of these phenomena, namely the interstices of ethnic and racial relations . Hence, for instance, the voluminous literature extant on Blacks and Jews in Western countries. However, the extension of the sociological perspective to other categories of people who have been historically discredited by the larger society-women, homosexuals, the young and the aged, the disabled-is recent and much less developed. There are salient differences between the various categories of discredited people. So-called ethnic minority people might be channelled into low-class socio-economic positions, but at the same time they often develop rich symbolic systems and sub-cultures, and sometimes full-fledged communities. Similarly, people who engage in specific behavior defined as illicit by the dominant groups of society, the so-called deviants, although inhibited from associating openly with each other, often do so covertly. Such social deviants tend to develop symbols and sub-cultures, sometimes even secret societies, though usually not fully institutionalized communities (see for instance, Sagarin 1969 and Pfuhl 1986, ch. 7). The presence of positive symbols encourages mutual reinforcement within communities of the discredited ; discredited people are then able to evaluate themselves more positively than do those who dominate them. People who are physically disabled do not evince this pattern; with the possible exception of the deaf, they do not usually construct sub-cultures of their own. The associations and friendship networks of disabled people have not been documented as being institutionalized societies to an extent similar to that of minority ethnic groups, and groups based on moral deviation.! The able-bodied in society 115 116 Blind People commonly evaluate the condition of disabled people negatively and channel them into segregated social niches. But disabled people, while basically acquiescing to this evaluation, do not usually cultivate symbols of their own to challenge it. Ethnic minorities can, through the creation of evocative slogans such as "Black is Beautiful!", legitimize themselves and counteract racism, but this course is, on the whole, not open to the disabled minorities. Despite the efforts of activists of the disability-rights movements, to develop positive sub-cultural symbols and organizations (such as described in Goldin 1984), it is a moot question how widely these activities are accepted among the masses of disabled people. Disabled people often seek to escape associating with other disabled people, in addition to being themselves rejected by the able-bodied. These actions of disabled people are pertinent to the broad issue of mutual rejection and association among the discredited : When and how do people express the situation of being discredited in terms of separate community formation? When do they refrain from associating with each other? Among people who are discredited in terms of ethnic and religious categories we encounter both proud, mutually supportive community building, and radical mutual rejection. I cite some examples from the field of Jewish sociology to indicate the broad spectrum of expression of the situation of discredit, even within a relatively narrow social field. Traditional Jewish communities in pre-modem societies were usually characterized by tight grouping, vigorous internal institutions and a rich sub-culture (Sharot 1976, ch. 1). On the other hand, among Central-European Jews, in the generations following the dissolution of the traditional communities, there emerged the phenomenon of "self-hatred" (Lewin 1948: 186-200). Between these poles, Shuval (1966) has quantified the phenomenon of mutual rejection among Jewish Moroccan immigrants in Israel who, upon arrival, found themselves near the bottom of the socio-economic ladder. And in a recent ethnography of Jewish emigrants from Israel in a New York borough, Shokeid (1988) has documented ambivalence in social relationships, that is linked with the emigrants' discredited position, both among American Jews and among their former countrymen. Mutual rejection among the discredited, as the case ofthe Jews shows, is highly variegated and sometimes absent. Also within the category of discredited people, among the particular category of the physically disabled, mutual rejection is not uniform. There are notable differences between various conditions. Thus, the condition of epilepsy, due to the particularly harsh stigma that it carries, leads to the extreme of mutual...

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