Author: turtle

Middle School Traumas

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There’s a Mathematical Equation That Proves I’m Ugly Or So I Learned in My Seventh-Grade Art Class by Ariel Henley

This essay was about a young girl with Crouzon Syndrome and how she found beauty in herself, even when everyone and everything is telling her otherwise. Her story is focused on her experience in a middle school art class where they learn about the golden ratio that mathematically defines feminine beauty within art. Throughout the class, this girl tries to find a way to be comfortable in her own skin and feel beautiful.

“Beauty is subjective” (46)

“”Fix me””(42)

“I have never understood mathematical equations or ratios, so the only thing I learned from her lesson was that these were the beauty standards a woman must meet if she wanted to be deemed worthy” (41)

I think the main take away for me from this essay is that beauty cannot be defined. It’s subjective to the eye of the beholder and there is beauty in absolutely everything around us. I also really liked that this was about this girl finding beauty and seeing herself as beautiful. I think often in these stories we hear about people dealing with physical deformation problems that end up finding beauty in their personality and they’re inside rather than their outside. I understand how important it is and that what’s on the inside matters but it’s nice to read a story where someone doesn’t give up on their personal appearance and finds beauty in their physical outsides as well.

Performance and Expression

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The film Sins Invalid is a contemplation of performances from a show by different artists in the disability community. Poets, dancers, musicians, and actors come together on the stage to create a raw and pure performance of emotion. Expressing, not only their identity, but their sexuality, race, and experience as being disabled in an honest way. Between performances, there was commentary on the creative process and experiences the performers had while creating and performing their acts on the stage for live audiences.

Something I made a connection to between the film and the Keywords for Disability Studies books was sexualization. In the chapter about race the author writes, “For instance, the public’s morbid fascination with the sexualized bodies of Saartjie Baartman, the South African woman known as the “hottest Venus.””(146). It was common in the past for people of race or disability to be sexualized in a negative, unwanted way by the public. In this film, we see people of different race and disability reclaiming their sexuality and how they feel about their bodies, despite the opinions and misconception of others. The other connection I made was to the chapter about the topic of the word queer, “”Queer” opposes not heterosexuality but heteronormativity-the often unspoken assumption that heterosexuality provides the framework through which everything makes sense.” (143). Not only does the film challenge misconceptions of disability but it breaks down heteronormativity, opening our eyes to other people’s sexuality, sex, and experience that should be but is not viewed as ‘normal’ due to the concept of heteronormativity.

I really enjoyed watching this film. To watch people own their identities, to stand on a stage and listen and watch them proclaim their truths and who they are was incredibly powerful and inspirational to me. Each performer told their story, their experience and how they see themselves and their body. It just felt so raw and honest to me and I really loved that. I think this film is also incredibly powerful because it changes the perspective of the viewers. It breaks through the misconceptions and stereotypes that media and society have created about the sexuality and lives of people with disability. I find that incredibly impactful.

4.5/5 Stars

Disability and Race

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  • Race by Nirmala Erevelles
  • This essay is about the direct connection people make between the experience of people of color and the experience of people with disability. Erevelles walks the reader through the pros and cons of this. The author’s argument is that essentially by saying ‘disability is like race’ people are trying to push disability into a broader social recognition as a political minority. Erevelles continues to explain how this has assisted the Disability Rights Movement in moving forward but at the same time created violent and oppressive overtones for disability. She then comes to a conclusion, “Thus, more robust and complex analyses of race and disability are necessary for us to move beyond the initial conceptual space of analogy.” (Erevelles, 148).
  • I found this essay intriguing, especially as a person of color. I thought it was interesting how the history of disability and race lined up in some ways. For example, Erevelles writes, “They were transformed into spectacles for popular consumption and economic profit” (Erevelles, 146). The best example I can think of this is circuses, originally the circus was a compiled group of ‘freaks’ from around the world. These so-called freaks were people of color and people with disability, put on stage for people to make fun of or laugh at, even sexualizes, so others could make money. I understand why disability and race should not be made a direct analogy, in my mind it belittles both group’s experiences, but I do see how making connections like this help us empathize, learn, and understand each other further. I think another thing that stood out to me was the fact that institutions mix race and disability into one big category, specifically in schools. Erevelles writes, “Special education classes became the spaces where African American and Latino students were ghettoized” (Erevelles, 147). This was something I could connect to because people with color and disability were immediately grouped into the special education classes, and that is one thing that I experienced throughout my life that I look back on now and see as problematic.

Linton and Terminology

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  • “Reassigning Meaning” By Simi Linton
  • In this excerpt, Linton lists the different terminology to refer to or speak of people with disabilities. She goes through all the terms and their different categories, explaining exactly why they are problematic, frowned upon, and used, “The present examination of disability has no need for the medical language of symptoms and diagnostic categories.”(2). They argue that almost all words and phrases can be oppressive or offensive. First, she opens up with the claim that disability and the medical significance is unnecessary. From there, Simi points out all the problems with different words such as ‘ableism’ or ‘overcoming a disability’ and why these need to be addressed, “To say that I am physically challenged is to state that the obstacles to my participation are physical, not social, and that the barrier is my own disability”(14). Finally, she concludes that with the spreading of knowledge and awareness there will be better and more accurate terminology for disabled people as well as the power abled people have over this, “Similarly, it is important to examine the non disabled position and its privilege and power” (32). Overall, this was a very informative and interesting excerpt.
  • I think what stuck with me the most was the fact that almost every phrase or term that I use is offensive in some way. I had not thought deeply about these terms, I just accepted them as they were and maybe that was due to the exposure I grew up with and what I learned from parents, family, and just people in my community. It made me mad realizing that not only have we put these people in a group but we have created terms that are inappropriate and no one seems to care to understand that. It makes me upset that this is not something that is taught in schools or studied closely. We learn about racism, sexism, yet this does not qualify for some reason? In a way, I feel as if the education system has failed me in this way. My lack of knowledge and the fact that I had not realize that my lack of knowledge was present on this topic, makes me upset. I make it a goal to be as informed and respectful about topics like these and I feel like I have failed here.
  • Language and labels are so important. In my personal opinion, words are the most powerful thing in the world. They cannot be taken back and people remember them for the rest of their lives. Words start wars and forms relationships. Something that can do such drastic things holds power. This reading really reminded me of that opinion. The way that words effect people and can change a generation, or a group. These terms influence how people view themselves in terms of self image as well as society. This is something that needs to be addressed, finding ways to respect people should be a priority and in this case, it feels like it is not.

Unintended Orphans

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The film The Kids Aren’t Alright gives us an inside look at what it is like to suffer from a disability and get unwanted and unhelpful assistance. The film centers the story of a telethon created by Jerry Lewis and the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) that is meant to raise money and donations to help look for a cure to this condition. The film highlights that this telethon is counterproductive. The telethon is created to get people to pity and feel bad for people with Muscular Dystrophy, to guilt them into donating. Jerry Lewis and the MDA paint this unrealistic picture that people with this condition are suffering, that they are not able to live life to the fullest. That these people desire a cure for their condition, as if it is a requirement to live a full life. Jerry’s Orphans challenge this perception that Jerry Lewis and the MDA has created. They bring to light the fact that they can live happy lives full of love, happiness, and fulfillment and they are not looking for anyone’s pity.

The rhetor in this documentary is the creator, Mike Ervin, and his goal with this film is to bring to light the misconceptions and truths of living with Muscular Dystrophy. Ervin establishes his personal authority by speaking about his personal experience as someone with Muscular Dystrophy, he gets people to empathize with him by sharing personal stories of discrimination and hardships he has faced while bringing to light a corrupt system and organization. Him, and the rest of Jerry’s Orphans, go about trying to accomplish this by leading non violent protests during these telethons, handing out pamphlets, making phone calls to people in power, and simply educating people on what it is to be a person with this disability and what we can do to actually help them.

I give this film a four out of five stars. I think the film did a great job highlighting the voices of those with Muscle Dystrophy and explaining what is offensive, disrespectful, and ignorant about Jerry Lewis’s yearly telethon. It did a wonderful job depicting the actions and success but also the obstacles that Jerry’s Orphans have experienced and taken. The one thing I wish the film did was tell the viewer how to be of assistance. By watching the film I am know educated and enlightened on these people’s struggle and experience but the film does not tell me how to take action or in what way they would like us to help them with their cause.