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Second, this has been an amazing opportunity to dive into the literature of the growing field of disabilities studies. It’s been an education in the truest sense of the word. I’ve been affirmed in some of the aspects of my own particular struggle. I’ve also had my own particular assumptions about the disabled challenged.
Susan Wendell (The Rejected Body: Feminist Philosophical Reflections on Disability, 1996) writes about disability and modern performance expectations (37). This is part of the much broader issue of the social construction of disability. I really understand that, and feel affirmed, since I suffer on some days, from a crippling fatigue. I really appreciated Wendell and immediately recommended it to others.
Robert Murphy (The Body Silent: The Different World of the Disabled) uses his background as an anthropologist to describe the ways his life changed with encroaching disability from a spinal tumor. Although Wendell also talks about “the myth of control,” it was while reading Murphy that I really got it. The myth of control oppresses the disabled and chronically ill because it suggests that it is their fault. That in some way that can be blamed for their challenges. This is, of course, not acceptable or reasonable.
These are only two of the texts the I have read in preparation for writing this paper. This is amazing research that is helping me become a better human being.