Disability Rhetoric

Disability Visibility is a multi-author book filled with numerous short narratives from the perspective of those living with a disability. Separated into four distinct categories, the stories may seem overlapping in tone or themes, but not in the sense that every experience is the same. If you are to take anything away from this wonderful novel, it should be the emotional ties that are in this book between authors (that do not know one another) and the ones that are created from author to reader. An important note, and one I tend to highlight, is the inclusion of different mental and physical bodyminds. When I refer to bodyminds, what I really mean is the non-separation that exists between the human body and mind. This novel celebrates every kind of different bodymind that we typically don’t see represented in regular media (tv, movies, literature, news etc.). And with the exposure of this book, the authors represent themselves in their own voice on their own terms.  

Some might wonder why such a piece of literature needs to exist, why does this matter so much? That’s a wonderful first question to have. Disability Visibility is for the humanization of those living with a different bodymind than the status quo through the artistic use of short, educational, passionate narratives. It does not serve to explain or justify everything to the reader. The authors may very well have had to feel that unnecessary burden in their life already, and that is just it. To take the time to formally step-by-step educate a reader throughout this book is to justify their existence, to strip away their right of just being. With the power of storytelling, you get moments of insight and truth like this; “Fortunately, love isn’t a collection of capacities, of practical contributions. My love isn’t diminished by my inability to carry my son up the stairs, just as it isn’t diminished by the fact that I didn’t carry him inside the uterus.” (Pg. 132). This excerpt is from one of the shortest chapters and it is written by Jessica Slice. Slice spends no time explaining any social stigmas associated with her disability, nor does she define any terms. Instead, the chapter is mainly dealing with her range of emotions and thoughts when discussing her identity through motherhood.  

The novel is not an academic piece. It is written in an extremely personal manner but still reads with an energy of empowerment, passion, and wit. Through the narratives one can see the marriage between relationships in the outside world to the growing one with oneself. Author s.e. Smith says it best in their chapter claiming, “Members of many marginalized groups have this shared experiential touchstone, this sense of unexpected and vivid belonging and an ardent desire to be able to pass this experience along.” (Pg. 272). Smith masterfully switches between a storytelling, descriptive perspective to a large-scale one critiquing social normalization and ableist opinions that object to what they name “crip spaces.” Each narrative provides some readers a relaxed feeling of “I’m being seen” while giving others a necessary call-in to see things in a new light with necessary self-reflection. The pieces are intimate. You feel like you’re having a conversation with the author and most of the time in my experience, the conversation does not end there. Whether you find yourself in an academic setting discussing the stories or just a group of friends, it’s almost promised the words on the pages will have you translating what it meant to you with someone else. The novel is a true love letter to identity and the human spirit that thrives off being unique in harmony with the bodymind you have. With that, I leave you with another quote by Dancer Alice Sheppard: 

“I have come a long way from the brokenness of disability expected by the nondisabled world to an imagined space where the binary of “broken” and “whole” seems to exist. I look forward to learning about the effects of this thinking and to discovering what is next.” (Pg. 167).