E. Hamilton (German)
4 HU, WRi, 4 Hours
Fall Semester FYSP 093-01 MWF 2:30-3:20
What is disability? Who defines it, and how?
Many think of disability as something that a doctor diagnoses, something that requires treatment or cure. Others see disability as a social problem, often casting the disabled as weak people who need the help of the strong. More than one religio-philosophic tradition finds in disability the bodily reflection of moral failure, a physical punishment for sin. Literature and the arts have long used disability as a metaphor for any number of conflicts or challenges.
How do people with disabilities see themselves?
This seminar examines conceptual and historical models of disability, studying how, by whom, and under what circumstances any given definition of disability emerges. Natural science, social science, and the humanities all have different ways of understanding disability. Students in this seminar will analyze these intellectual frameworks in order to assess their strengths and limitations. We will pay close attention to authorship and agency. How do stories of disability change when people with disabilities hold the pen, the paintbrush, the microphone, or the senate floor?
Works to be studied include memoir, poetry, film, painting, music, drama, history, public policy, and the documents of activism. Underpinning this study are questions about access and inclusion: what barriers exist to full participation in society? Are those barriers located within the body itself, or in the built world? Can they be removed? Whose obligation is it to ensure access? What are the benefits of inclusion? Is there ever a time when the costs are too high?
Employing a practical and local approach to these questions, this seminar will examine access both on Oberlin’s campus and around Lorain County. Student will learn to assess barriers and design practical approaches to modifying or removing them.