A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of - Etheses - Queen Margaret ...

Surinder is frank in describing what she saw as the benefits of being classed as disabled:
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...then I thought well, I am a disabled person… great, that means I can get some help
with all the things I need help with, like I don‟t need to go walking miles, I can get a
parking permit… so there were some advantages to it… (l.1:353ff.)
Rose highlights the fact that for her accepting disability as a personal description was more a
pragmatic issue than one which, on the face of it, involved identity issues:
..I still didn‟t think of myself as being disabled… as being a member of what I now like
to think of as the disability community... I was still, more, I think, a member of… the
whole community and culture… what I wanted to do to… er… try and start getting help
with… er… things like ramps, and walking sticks and… er, parking discs and so on,
erm... was to get myself registered as a disabled person… (l.1:189ff.)
Tension is experienced here because an unspoken agreement takes place that acceptance of
entitlement to benefits involves acceptance not just of a description as disabled but also of the
disabled role. While entitlements are gained which go some way towards addressing the realities
of living with impairment in a disabling society, this position involves an acceptance of the view
which states that impairment is unfortunate individual circumstance.
“I see myself as a person with...”
I would see myself as a person with a visual impairment, not a visually-impaired
person… (l.784)
In this statement, Roshni places her sense of personhood above her sense of being disabled
and situates herself as a subject of what Rod Michalko has called „person-first‟ ideology
(Michalko, 2002:10). Impairment is downplayed and regarded as distinct from her primary
experience as a person.
Suggesting that disability is merely a secondary feature of one‟s identity and that we
are persons first and persons with disabilities disavows both deviance and disability.
It refocuses attention from the disability to the person who happens to have it
(Michalko, 2002:11).