Enforcing Normalcy: Disability, Deafness, and the BodyIn this highly original study of the cultural assumptions governing our conception of people with disabilities, Lennard J. Davis argues forcefully against “ableist” discourse and for a complete recasting of the category of disability itself. Enforcing Normalcy surveys the emergence of a cluster of concepts around the term “normal” as these matured in western Europe and the United States over the past 250 years. Linking such notions to the concurrent emergence of discourses about the nation, Davis shows how the modern nation-state constructed its identity on the backs not only of colonized subjects, but of its physically disabled minority. In a fascinating chapter on contemporary cultural theory, Davis explores the pitfalls of privileging the figure of sight in conceptualizing the nature of textuality. And in a treatment of nudes and fragmented bodies in Western art, he shows how the ideal of physical wholeness is both demanded and denied in the classical aesthetics of representation. Enforcing Normalcy redraws the boundaries of political and cultural discourse. By insisting that disability be added to the familiar triad of race, class and gender, the book challenges progressives to expand the limits of their thinking about human oppression. |
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What I've read seems fascinating. However, I can't read the whole book because my disability makes reading hard copy books very arduous so I only tend to read ebooks. Unfortunately this book isn't available in ebook format! Which is a case of sad irony given the topic.
Contents
Constructing Normalcy | 23 |
How Europe Became | 50 |
The Nineteenth Century | 73 |
Disability and Theory | 100 |
The Classical Nude | 126 |
Uneasy Positions Disability | 158 |
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able appearance associated assumptions attempt average became becomes begin blind body called century characters cited concept connection consider constructed course create critic culture deaf defined described Desloges disability disabled body discourse dumb eighteenth ethnic eugenics example existence fact female fragmented function hand hearing human ibid idea ideal identity images impairment individual involved issue kind linguistic linked living meaning mental narrative nation nature needs never norm normal normalcy notes novel object observer particularly performance person physical political position possible practices problem production question race reader reading relation represent Roosevelt seems seen sense sexual sign language signifying silence social society speak speech story studies tend term thought touch tradition turned understand University Venus visual whole women writing written
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Bibliographic information
| Title | Enforcing Normalcy: Disability, Deafness, and the Body ACLS Humanities E-Book Enforcing Normalcy: Disability, Deafness, and the Body, Lennard J. Davis |
| Author | Lennard J. Davis |
| Publisher | Verso, 1995 |
| ISBN | 1859840078, 9781859840078 |
| Length | 203 pages |
| Subjects | › › Political Science / Public Policy / Social Services & Welfare Social Science / Discrimination Social Science / Sociology / Social Theory |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |