3.2: Language
Section aim
This section focuses on the language of disability. While much progress has been made over recent decades addressing the use of language in relation to disability, much remains to be done.
It contains a range of resources on use of language from the perspective of the disabled person. The objective is for you to reflect on your, and your organisations’, approach to language around disability.
Academic perspective
There are several academic perspectives of this areas which are likely to be of interest to you as you work through this section.
- Debbie Mausner – Dis/ability on Display: Performance, Practice, and Integration of Dancers with Physical Disabilities [PDF]
Focus in particular on the discussion around language in Part 1. - Laurence Clark and Stephen Marsh – Patriarchy in the UK: The Language of Disability [PDF]
- Colin Barnes – Disabling imagery and the Media [PDF]
Note in particular Part 3 and the discussion on language from the perspective of disabled people. - Scope’s End the Awkward campaign
- Colin Cameron – Why we are disabled people, not people with disabilities [Disability Arts Online]
- Mike Oliver – Politics and Language: Understanding the Disability Discourse
Note that important points about language and disability
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Consider Mike Oliver’s claim that:
“The imposition of colonial languages on the natives, Oxford English on the regions, sexist language on women, racist language on black people, spoken language on deaf people, and so on, are all forms of cultural domination. Pidgin, dialects, slang, anti-sexist and anti-racist language and sign language are not, therefore, quaint and archaic forms of language use but forms of cultural resistance.”
What relevance does this have for our use of language when speaking about disability? How does your organisation use language around disability. Will your approach change having read these sources?