GSFS 303 Syllabus
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GSFS 303 GENDER AND DISABILITY Yolanda Muñoz, Ph.D. Email: [email protected] Overview This course aims to give an introduction to disability as a category of analysis in Gender Studies. At the same time, the objective is to analyse able-body privilege and understand the social forces behind ableism that prevent the full implementation of the human rights approach to disability. Disability is a social experience of normalized exclusion and segregation that still many people consider only a “medical” and “personal” issue. However, the worldwide struggle initiated through the United Nations Decade for Disabled Persons (1983-1992) has created a growing consciousness of disabilities not as incurable illnesses or and individual “problem”, but as a relationship between the body and the symbolic value that each culture gives to the tasks that a person’s body is supposed to perform throughout life. This struggle promoted the adoption of the UN Convention of the Rights of People with Disabilities on December 2006, which in turn helped build and international movement for full implementation of the Convention and the promotion of a culture of human rights. Persons with disabilities represent one of the largest discriminated groups in the world, and the World Health Organization estimates that one in seven persons live with a disability, that is one billion persons. With the arrival of massive use of the Internet and other technologies, more and more persons with disabilities are gaining critical battles for social inclusion. This goal is pursued through advocating for the construction of inclusive environments, i.e., a wider scope of material and cultural conditions that enable persons with physical, sensorial, psychosocial or intellectual disabilities to take their own decisions, live in the community and fully exert their citizenship. Since the beginning of the 1990’s, women with disabilities around the world have tried to raise consciousness in their able-bodied counterparts about multiple forms of discrimination experienced when women do not fit with the ideal of “functional” and “beautiful” body and mind imposed by different societies. This course proposes to explore how disability would deepen and add complexity to Gender Studies by including this category on the reflections on how gender and body functions intersect with other aspects of identity, interacting with various systems of privilege and oppression. The fresh approach of Disability Justice allows to better understand deeply rooted ableist practices, and the course will explore this perspective as a possibility for social action. 1 GSFS 303 – Gender and Disability – Fall 2020 September 14 What is ableism and how it intersects with other systems of privilege and oppression? Mandatory visioning: Stella Young: “I’m not your inspiration, thank you very much” TedTalk: https://youtu.be/8K9Gg164Bsw Recommended readings: Evans, Elizabeth. “Disability and intersectionality: patterns of ableism in the women’s movement”. In Evans, Elizabeth, and Lépinard Éléonore, eds. 2020. Intersectionality in Feminist and Queer Movements: Confronting Privileges (version First edition.) First ed. Routledge Advances in Feminist Studies and Intersectionality. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. PP. 143-161 Nario-Redmond, Michelle R. 2020. Ableism: The Causes and Consequences of Disability Prejudice. Contemporary Social Issues. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons (“Introduction” pp. 1-34) Wolbring, Gregor. 2008. "The Politics of Ableism." Development 51 (2) (06): 252-258. https://mcgill.on.worldcat.org/oclc/6895704634 September 21st The moral, the medical, the human rights and the disability justice approaches to disability – a historical view of the construction of normalcy and stigma Mandatory reading: Clare, Eli. Brilliant Imperfection: Grappling with Cure. Durham: Duke University Press, 2017. Chapter 1. muse.jhu.edu/book/70980. Recommended reading: Davis, Lennard J. “Constructing Normalcy. The Bell Curve, the Novel and the Invention of the Disabled Body in the Nineteenth Century.” The Disability Studies Reader. Ed. Lennard J. Davis. New York – London: Routledge, Second Edition: 2006 [1997]. 3-16 September 28 Feminist Disability Studies – Building bridges between movements (Choose one of the following): Garland-Thomson, Rosemarie. “Integrating Disability, Transforming Feminist Theory”. In Smith, Bonnie G. and Hutchison, Beth (Eds.) 2004. Gendering Disability. New Brunswick, New Jersey & London: Rutdgers University Press, 2004. pp. 73-103 Bê, Ana. “Feminism and disability. A cartography of multiplicity” in Watson, N. (Ed.), Vehmas, S. (Ed.). 2020. Routledge Handbook of Disability Studies. London: Routledge, pp. 421-435 https://doi- org.proxy3.library.mcgill.ca/10.4324/9780429430817 2 GSFS 303 – Gender and Disability – Fall 2020 October 5 Disability or Crip Studies? – Questioning compulsory able-bodiedness and neurotypicality Choose one of the following: Hanna Bertilsdotter Rosqvist, Anna Stenning and Nick Chown. “Introduction”. In Bertilsdotter Rosqvist, Hanna, Nick Chown, and Anna Stenning, eds. 2020. Neurodiversity Studies : A New Critical Paradigm. Routledge Advances in Sociology, 285. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/9780429322297. McRuer, Robert. “Compulsory Able-bodiedness and Queer/Disabled Existence.” The Disability Studies Reader. 2nd ed., edited by Lennard J. Davis, New York, Routledge, 2006, pp. 88-99. October 19 Gender roles, racism and disability Holcomb, L. “Black and Crazy: The Antinomian Black Male in North American Consciousness”. In Brian, Kathleen M, and James W. Trent, eds. (2017). Phallacies : Historical Intersections of Disability and Masculinity. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. https://mcgill.on.worldcat.org/oclc/993623925 October 26 The hegemony of the visual in feminist studies: a critical Disability Studies Perspective. Choose one of the following: Garland-Thomson, Rosemarie. Staring: How We Look. Oxford University Press, USA, 2009. P. 186-196 Grealy, Lucy and Kleege, Georgina “Tyranny of the Visual” in Mintz, Susannah B. Unruly Bodies: Life Writing by Women with Disabilities. The University of North Carolina Press, 2009. Project MUSE. muse.jhu.edu/book/44055 November 2 Feminist theory and audism Choose one of the following: Brueggemann, Brenda Jo and Susan Burch. Women and Deafness: Double Visions. Gallaudet University Press, 2006. Project MUSE muse.jhu.edu/book/10669. Kafer, Alison.Feminist, Queer, Crip. 2013. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Project MUSE., https://muse.jhu.edu/. “Slippery Slopes, Cultural Anxiety, and the Case of the Deaf Lesbians” 3 GSFS 303 – Gender and Disability – Fall 2020 November 9 Invisible disabilities and chronic illness from a gender studies perspective Wendell, S. 2001. Unhealthy Disabled: Treating Chronic Illnesses as Disabilities. Hypatia, 16 (4), 17-33. doi:10.1111/j.1527-2001.2001.tb00751.x Diamond Shaindl. “Feminist Resistance against the Medicalization of Humanity: Integrating Knowledge about Psychiatric Oppression and Marginalized People” in Burstow, Bonnie. 2014. Psychiatry Disrupted: Theorizing Resistance and Crafting The (R)evolution. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press November 16 Disability and Sexual and Reproductive Rights Kafer, Alison. 2013. Feminist, Queer, Crip. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013. PP. 47-68. Project MUSE., https://muse.jhu.edu/. Ebrahim, Sumayya. “Disability Porn: The Fetishisation and Liberation of Disabled Sex”. In Chappell, Paul, and Marlene De Beer, eds. 2019. Diverse Voices of Disabled Sexualities in the Global South. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. PP. 77-99 https://mcgill.on.worldcat.org/oclc/1057688184 November 23 Representation vs Counter-representation: ableism in cultural production Mandatory reading: Houston, Ella. “Featuring Disabled Women in Advertisements. The Commodification of Diversity?” in Ellis, Katie, Gerard Goggin, Beth A Haller, and Rosemary Curtis, eds. 2020. The Routledge Companion to Disability and Media. New York, NY: Routledge. Pp. 50-58 Recommended audiovisual materials: Léduc, Vero. « C’est tombé dans l’oreille d’une Sourde » (court métrage). https://vimeo.com/221645243 Berne, P. (Director). (2013). Sins Invalid: An Unshamed Claim to Beauty [Video file]. New Day Films. Available in Kanopy (access through sign in from McGill Library) https://mcgill.kanopy.com/video/sins-invalid-unashamed- claim-beauty November 30 Disability and social movements: everywhere and nowhere at the same time. (Choose one of the following) Johnson, Valerie Ann “Bringing Together Feminist Disability Studies and Environmental Justice” in Ray, Sarah Jaquette, and Jay Sibara, eds. 2017. Disability Studies and the Environmental Humanities: Toward an Eco-Crip 4 GSFS 303 – Gender and Disability – Fall 2020 Theory. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press pp. 73-93 https://mcgill.on.worldcat.org/oclc/985925192 Gurung, Pratima. “Our lives, our story. The journey of the voiceless towards advocacy in Nepal”. In Soldatic, Karen, and Kelley Johnson, eds. 2020. Global Perspectives on Disability Activism and Advocacy: Our Way. Interdisciplinary Disability Studies. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781351237499. Native Women’s Association of Canada. “Aboriginal Women and Communicable/Chronic Diseases and Disabilities. An Issue Paper. Prepared for the National Aboriginal Women’s Summit, June 20-22, 2007. Corner Brook, NL, 2007. 1-8 December 3rd Gender, disability and the struggle for independent living: institutionalization, the jail