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Able-Bodied Womanhood: Disability Tropes and Corporeally Exclusionary Narratives in the Rhetoric of Black and White Women’S Rights Discourses, 1832-1932

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Able-Bodied Womanhood: Disability Tropes and Corporeally Exclusionary Narratives in the Rhetoric of Black and White Women’S Rights Discourses, 1832-1932 ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: ABLE-BODIED WOMANHOOD: DISABILITY TROPES AND CORPOREALLY EXCLUSIONARY NARRATIVES IN THE RHETORIC OF BLACK AND WHITE WOMEN’S RIGHTS DISCOURSES, 1832-1932 Heidi A Temple, Doctor of Philosophy, 2016 Dissertation directed by: Dr. Nancy L. Struna, Chair and Professor, American Studies Department This project is a feminist disability rhetorical analysis of US black and white women’s rights movements from 1832-1932. Guided by Disability and Feminist Theory, it works to identify the presence and use of patterns of disability tropes in women’s rights discourses. From Lucretia Coffin Mott to Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton to Mary Church Terrell, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman to Addie Hunton, this project interrogates the rhetorical work of dominant narratives and lesser known voices in women’s rights discourses. I argue that early black and white women’s rights advocates often utilized and repeated a disability rhetoric that relied on disability metaphor, narrative prosthesis, and corporeally exclusionary narratives in order to construct definitions of womanhood. Their insistence on cognitive ability as a marker of “fitness” and “ability” provided the foundation for rights arguments based on ableist assumptions of autonomy and citizenship. I also argue that this use of disability rhetoric relied on and furthered a pervasive ableist ideology present not only in many of these movements, but in US society. In the process, US black and white women’s rights discourses have continually elided women with disabilities from women’s rights discourses because their bodies (physically, cognitively, and/or psychologically) did not meet the ableist prerequisites set for claiming women’s rights during this time period. ABLE-BODIED WOMANHOOD: DISABILITY AND CORPOREALLY EXCLUSIONARY NARRATIVES IN BLACK AND WHITE WOMEN’S RIGHTS DISCOURSES, 1832-1932 by Heidi A Temple Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2016 Advisory Committee: Professor Nancy L Struna, Chair Dr. Christina B. Hanhardt Dr. Carrie Sandahl Dr. Jo Paoletti Dr. Gay Gullickson © Copyright by Heidi A Temple 2016 DEDICATION For women with disabilities whose voices and rights have been denied for too long ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Dad, for supporting me, even when you didn’t agree with my decisions Dr. Jocelyn L Buckner, unconditional, and unwavering ELP Dr. Ann Marie Thomas Saunders, editor extraordinaire and provider of hope Blessing Enekwe, writing partner, life-line, and fellow black jelly bean-lover The Bioengineering Department at the University of Maryland, College Park Fatty, Snug, Gibbs, and Misfit for snuggles and cuddles Panera, Starbucks, and Wegmans for their free wi-fi working spaces Library of Congress, Madison and Jefferson Buildings staff and research specialists New York Public Library, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Dedication ........................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgements ............................................................................................................ iii Table of Contents ............................................................................................................... iv List of Abbreviations ........................................................................................................ vii Chapter One: Introduction ..............................................................................................1 The Personal is Political: .....................................................................................................1 What is Disability Rhetoric? Research Questions and Theoretical Frameworks ...............5 Rhetoric and Disability ...................................................................................................6 Metaphor and Disability .................................................................................................8 Ableist Rhetoric and Ideology .........................................................................................9 Additional Theoretical Underpinnings .........................................................................11 Sources and Methods .........................................................................................................18 Method for Rhetorical Analysis ....................................................................................20 Defining Terms ..................................................................................................................23 Literature Review: Disability Rhetoric and Black and White Women’s Rights Movements .........................................................................................................................28 The Field: Scholarly Position Within American Studies ..................................................33 The Road Map: Chapter Outline .......................................................................................35 Chapter Two: Autonomy and Ableism: Defining Womanhood ................................38 Dreaded Dependence: White Women’s CENs of Autonomy ...........................................39 Elizabeth Cady Stanton: Cognitive Ableism and Fear Tactics ....................................44 Lucretia Mott: The “Cult of Able-Bodied Womanhood” ............................................59 iv Redefining and Reinforcing Womanhood: Black Women’s CENs of Intellect ...............70 Maria Miller Stewart: Ableist Morality and Cognitive Ability ....................................71 Sojourner Truth: Claiming an Able-Bodied Black Womanhood .................................79 Intersections of Disability Rhetoric in Black and White Women’s Rights Discourses .....85 Chapter Three: Voting and Reform: Cognitively Ableist Prescriptions for Citizenship ........................................................................................................................90 Cognitive Ableism and Limited Suffrage: White Women’s Movements .........................92 The NAWSA, Limited Suffrage, and Cognitive Ableism ..............................................93 The Woman’s Journal Debate on Limited Suffrage ....................................................101 Cognitive Ableism and Elevating the Race: Black Women and the Future ...................118 Mary Church Terrell and Fannie Barrier Williams in the White Public Sphere .......119 Terrell, Williams, and the NACW: Intellect and Morality in Black Public Spaces ...127 Intersections of Cognitive Ableism in Black and White Women’s Rights .....................134 Chapter Four: Eugenics and Ableism: Constructing Motherhood ..........................137 Thoroughbreds and Supermen: White Women’s Eugenic Discourses of Reproduction 140 Eliminating Defectives and Degenerates: Charlotte Perkins Gilman .......................140 Ableist Reproductive Freedom: Margaret Sanger and The Birth Control Review ...153 Negroes on “The Negro Problem”: Cognitive and Pyschological Ableism ...................166 Intellectual and Responsible Motherhood: Addie W. Hunton and Josie B. Hall ......167 The Birth Control Review: The Negro “Number” ......................................................175 Intersections of Ableism in Black and White Women’s Reproductive Rights ................188 v Chapter Five: Feminist Disability Scholarship in Twenty First Century AMST ...193 Rhetorical Conclusions: Rhetoric is an Action and Rhetoric is Intentional ...................204 Lingering Tropes of Disability in 21st Century Narratives ..............................................212 Disability “Inspiration Porn” – the Strongest Cultural Narrative? ..................................222 Countering the Dominant Narratives – Ableism and Difference .....................................212 Bibliography ...................................................................................................................234 Primary Sources ...............................................................................................................234 Secondary Sources ...........................................................................................................238 vi ABBREVIATIONS CENs Corporeally Exclusionary Narratives DoS Declaration of Sentiments NACW National Association of Colored Women NAWSA National American Woman Suffrage Association vii Chapter One: Introduction All known theories of human rights, whether based on humanity, social contract theory, utilitarianism, or citizenship, exclude individuals from the rights-bearing community if they do not possess the specific abilities required for membership. […] understand that the human-rights discourse will never break free from the ideology of ability until it includes disability as a defining characteristic of human beings. Moreover, the practice of granting rights to only those people capable of demonstrating a prescribed level of physical and mental ability must be swept away if being human is to serve as a universal standard for political membership. Basing human rights on disability, however, presents a more minimum standard for universality.1 The Political is Personal: Claiming a Feminist Disability Position in Scholarship My disability identity is not a visible one, unless you count my facial scarring. But I never did. Others, however, have perceived
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