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Introduction
'Nature, Mr Allnut, is what we are put in this world to rise above.'
Rose Sayer (Katharine
Hepburn) in The African Queen (John Huston, GB, 1951)
'I feel that life is divided
up into the horrible and the miserable; those are the two categories, you know:
the horrible would be like - um - I don't know, terminal cases, blind people,
cripples. I don't know how they get
through life, it's amazing to me. The
miserable is everybody else. So when
you go through life you should be grateful that you're miserable; you're very
lucky to be miserable.'
Alvy Singer (Woody Allen) in Annie Hall (Woody Allen, US, 1977)
In this introduction it is essential that I clarify
certain things: the meaning of 'disability' as I have used the term in the thesis;
what films are at the core of the study, and why I have chosen those films in
particular. Most importantly, though,
is that I outline the methodological approach to be used and the way it is to
be applied. I start by giving a brief
introduction into what constitutes 'disability'.
What is Disability?
In any discussion of disability, let alone disability imagery, terminology
and definitions are key factors in determining how it is seen and then 'interpreted'.
Most Western states employ a definition advanced by the World Health
Organisation (WHO), in order to carry out their social policy (Barnes,
1992). It has three distinctions:
impairment, disability and handicap, encapsulated by Barnes (1992) as follows:
'[i]mpairment'
refer[s] to a defective limb, organ or mechanism of the body, 'disability' as
the resulting lack of function, and 'handicap' denotes the limitations on daily
life which ensue from disability. (p.6)
Consequently,
from this definition a 'handicapped' person has an 'impairment' which produces
the 'disability' and, as such, is 'handicapped' by that 'disability' and 'impairment';
the whole definition rests upon the body of the individual who has the impairment.
Thus, disability, according to this definition, is based on a pathological
and individualised model commonly known as the Medical Model. The Medical Model has
a philosophy and interpretation that has their foundation in the Enlightenment
(Davis, 1995), the rise of the medical profession (Foucault, 1977[a]), and industrial
capitalism - workers had to be classified as those who could work, who could not
and who would not (Oliver, 1990). Also, around the time of the Industrial Revolution, organised
charity and philanthropy started to employ the Medical Model of
impairment as the main definition of disability (Stone, 1984); the medical definition
helped to define those who should receive charity, or state aid, and those who
should not. People with impairments
started to be named 'disabled people'; i.e., their up-until-then irrelevant impairments
were made significant in the social construction of abnormality and normality
(cf. Foucault, 1977[a]; Oliver,
1990; Oliver, 1996; Davis, 1995).
Disability is, thus, in the Medical
Model, a 'personal
tragedy' rather than anything to do with society or its social processes.
It is pathological. Many disabled
people, and the organisations that they have founded, are highly critical of such
a definition as it de-socialises a condition that they perceived as being socially
constructed. For the disability movement
(cf. Campbell and Oliver, 1996) people with physical impairments are disabled
not by their physical impairments (pathological realities) but by socially constructed
barriers (their social disablement) placed upon and around them by society.
It is a society that is built to exclude them physically from such entities
as buses, buildings, education, employment and leisure facilities, thus bearing
out a theory that is, in essence, the Social Model of disability (Oliver, 1990; and Oliver, 1991). The Social Model I am using has been developed,
defined and refined predominantly by Michael Oliver (1990; 1996; Oliver and Barnes,
1998). It is a materialistic model
and one that adheres to basic Marxian concepts of ideology and hegemony (coming
from a Gramscian development of Marxist philosophy). The definition of disability that organisations
of (rather than for) disabled people's use takes into account the social exclusion of people
with impairments by a world (socio-politically, economically and culturally) created
and maintained by able-bodied norms rooted in a capitalist means of production,
one which has various ideologies that are either in the superstructure and / or
support the capitalist structures that exist in Western capitalist countries (Gleeson,
1999; Shakespeare, 1998). For Hevey (1992) disability is entirely
a political issue:
[D]isability: the disadvantage or restriction of activity caused by a contemporary
social organisation which takes no or little account of people who have physical
(or mental) impairments and thus excludes them from the mainstream of social activities.
(Hevey, 1992. p.9)
The Social Model’s definition of disability is based on
the fact of discrimination and the social exclusion of people with impairments,
grounded in the assumption that the disabled are socially constructed as abject
and not the natural results of a physical limitation or difference within any
given individual. The Social Model challenges the WHO model by having 'disability'
as being that which they label 'handicap'; the Social Model of
disability amalgamates WHO's definitions of 'disability'
and 'impairment' whilst also making them irrelevant to issues of 'disability'. The Social Model definition
is often broken down into three main categories of discrimination (cf. Barnes
1991). It offers categories emphasising
three types of barriers that are used to exclude and discriminate against people
with impairments: the attitudinal, the institutional and the environmental. Disabled
critics are beginning to reveal the processes of disablement – from a Social
Model perspective - in all
aspects of society. This trend has
been demonstrated, for example, by many writers in relation to disability and
the State (Oliver, all references; Stone, 1984), the law (Gooding, 1994; 1996)
and the media (Barnes, 1992; Norden, 1994; Kimpton-Nye, 1994; Kimpton-Nye, 1997).
Such writing is also now appearing in the fields of medicine (Armstrong,
1983; Bogdan, 1988; Turner, 1992), charities (Hevey, 1992), and housing and education
(Barnes, 1991; Barton, 1989).
The Union of the Physically Impaired Against Segregation (UPIAS), in
1975, defined disability, using an early form of the Social Model, as:
the
loss or limitation of opportunities to take part in the normal life of the community
on an equal level with others due to physical and social barriers. (Barnes, 1992.
p.7)
The UPIAS definition emphasises the exclusions placed
upon people with impairments in relation to normal activities, but such definitions
call for equality with normal others, assuming that this is all that disabled
people (as a socially constructed group) want. Significantly, its weakness for academics
such as Oliver and Barnes (1998) is that the UPIAS definition
assumes, at least in theory, a normal capability for all disabled people along
with the notion that normal is an actual and comparable reality.
The above criticism is based upon the assumption that by aligning issues
of disability with normality, one both degrades impairment as a lived experience
and participates in the further segregation of those with extreme or multiple
impairments that cannot be brought under any definition of normality, no matter
how wide. Some disabled people (Barnes,
1990; Liggett, 1988) acknowledge the Social Model as
a step forward from the Medical Model but fear its appropriation
by those who wish to put the emphasis on something that the disabled (or anybody
else) are not, i.e., normal people.
Goffman (1990; 1991), for example, falls into this category as he posits
a theory that places the management of impairment on the disabled individual.
Goffman argues that the impaired individual must cope with his / her own spoilt
identity as it is his / her own problem.
Although Goffman acknowledges a degree of social construction in deviancy
and abnormality, he nevertheless suggests that it is the individual 'deviant's'
responsibility either to change or to ameliorate its effects. Perhaps the problem with Goffman's approach
is that while it acknowledges a Social Model perspective,
in the abstract, it is trapped into seeing society as having no role in the subsequent
'management' of impairment or abnormality; that is left to the individual.
Goffman thereby validates an individualised definition of disability because,
although the individual is subject to social construction and / or internalisation
of what is placed by society at large upon that individual's identity, the responsibility
for the amelioration of that 'crisis' is still primarily the task of the individual.
Other writers, primarily Liggett (1988), Abberley (1987) and, in relation
to the Deaf community (a capital ‘D’ specifically denotes those who
use sign language and identify themselves as part of a Deaf culture), Davis (1995),
view disability through what they call an interpretative methodology based on
Foucauldian ideas. This approach
discusses disability genealogically, placing it in its historical perspective
and trying to draw conclusions regarding who benefits from the creation of the
disabled and what power relations exist as a consequence.
Such writers conclude that capitalism is the principal beneficiary of an
established status quo (Oliver
and Barnes, 1998), however biased. Liggett argues that as capitalism has evolved within a shifting
base of employment conditions and practices, the definition and scope of disability
have shifted in order to deal with its own crises (of capitalism). This indicates, for Liggett, disability’s
arbitrariness and implicit link to social processes, rather than its being some
scientific or immutable definition.
Equally, Stone, in The Disabled State (1984),
identifies the medical profession as the gatekeepers to non-medical state and
charity benefits, thereby making the medical profession, intrinsically linked
to capitalist modes of production, one of the key groups in the modern construction
of disability. This view is based
upon the assumption of the profession’s ability to cure (normalise) the
abnormal or care for (discipline) the impaired. Significantly, though, Stone argues
that as the number of disabled people has increased, other professions have been
brought in to interpret and construct disability in their own way: social workers;
welfare professionals; charity workers; the 'disability industries' (Hevey, 1992)
making prostheses and normalising aids; and professionals to train the 'disability
industry' professionals. Concomitantly, as ever-increasing numbers
of the disabled have needed to be managed, corresponding new class(es) of managers
has been created to manage that increase. For a critique of the historical perspective utilised by Stone
see Gleeson (1999).
Interestingly, the political Right are beginning to accept disabled people's
demands for equality, arguing that they are 'normal people really', in order to
subvert a benefit system which renders disabled people dependent. The benefit system forces many disabled
people to stay on those benefits because if they obtained work or participated
in other activities the benefits would be withdrawn. Thus, it is financially beneficial to be as impaired / disabled
as possible in order to maintain a standard of living that would otherwise become
impossible, especially in the face of attitudinal and environmental barriers and
generalised discrimination and exclusion (Oliver and Barnes, 1998).
Consequently, the post-war welfare system makes the disabled dependent
by taking away benefits if they show any sign of independence (Berthoud et
al, 1993;
Drake, 1999). Significantly, the
political Right have appropriated an element of political disability theory /
politics in order merely to reduce benefits rather than to increase independence,
claiming that benefits make the disabled dependent (Berthoud et al, 1993; and Russell, 1998). Disability
political theory does not overtly criticise such actions if these exist within
a framework that challenges other forms of the oppression or exclusion of the
impaired at the same time. Either way, it must still be stated that impairment does cost
more to live with, and disabled people will often need more money to maintain
the same standard of living as do others who have no impairment. The Social Model does
not deny the pathological elements of living with impairments (Barnes, 1998) as
some critics would suggest (Crow, 1996; and Morris, 1996). Consequently, from either a Medical
Model (pathological) or Social Model (socio-cultural) perspective,
disability is a social issue both financially (Medical Model) and
politically (Social Model).
This brings us back to the Social Model’s
articulation for a form of equality that accepts difference; for this nexus impairment
is different, but not inferior, and it is only when this factor is accepted that
equalising action will be given as of right and not as charity.
Having aid, of any kind, given paternalistically, which is how the benefit
system or current disability equality legislation is framed (Berthoud et al, 1993;
Oliver and Barnes, 1998), merely reinforces the disabled as child-like, dependent
and reliant on the 'goodwill' of others. Ultimately, such paternalistic social policies reinforce the
construction of disability within the personal tragedy theory (Oliver, 1996).
In a recent work on social policy the two leading theorists on the Social
Model of
disability, Michael Oliver and Colin Barnes (1998), have distilled the model down
to its purest basics - the inclusion and / or exclusion of disabled people in
all forms of social processes. This
thesis, in using the Social Model and
following in the theoretical footsteps of Oliver and Barnes (all their work),
identifies how cinematic representations of the disabled show, reinforce, and
validate the social exclusion or inclusion of the impaired and the disabled.
A key element in the use of the Social Model in
this thesis is that its roots lie in the ‘Construction Of’ school
of thought, just as does representation theory. Consequently, they are ideal partners
when used in conjunction in this thesis.
The Social Model uses and, to a large extent, identifies what
constitutes the Medical Model. The Social Model defines the Medical Model - identifying
the nature of its pathological exclusivity – as part of its own theoretical
basis and methodology. The Social
Model offers a perspective from which it builds an
inclusive model that is non-pathologically orientated. As such, this thesis, in utilising the
Social Model and representation theory as exemplified by the representation of school
of writers, is largely concerned with identifying Medical Model (pathologising)
practices and ideologies to reveal the hegemony of Medical Model practices that dominate, in contrast to inclusive Social Model ones.
Consequently, herein, I am applying the Social Model theory of disability as a methodological
approach to identify Medical Model ideologies.
By adopting two constructionist theories I am using the two most appropriate
methodological approaches that complement each other with no inherent inconsistencies.
There has been a move to create a third way of disability theory and politics,
a perspective premised upon the integration of impairment into the Social Model of Disability – a non-binary paradigm rather than the Social / Medical
Model dichotomy. This is largely
motivated by feminist writers such as Morris (1992; 1996) and Crow (1992; 1996)
who suggest that the experience of impairment should be segmented into or subsumed
under the Social Model of disability. This move is needed, they argue, because
women’s experiences have been ignored and because impairment is a vital
part of their disabled identity that has hitherto been ignored. In addition, and as a result of the displacement
of the experience of impairment, they argue that Social Model theory
is a man’s theory designed for the benefit of men. Combined with this, Morris and Crow (ibid) maintain
that the Social Model implies that the problems of
impairment will cease to exist once the social processes of disablement are challenged
and eradicated. In response Barnes
(1996) argues that impairment is at the heart of the Medical Model's appropriation of disabled people’s identity because it focuses
on impairments and, therefore, the Social Model is
an alternative which is more balanced and less liable to corruption from the medical
profession. In relation to
the role and significance of women Barnes (ibid) is
categorical in stating that disability theory and politics have fully included
women to the extent that women have indeed been more influential than have men
in this context.
Barnes argues that the role of medical sociologists in exploring (often
negatively) impairment issues is well documented and that it has, indeed, offered
valuable information and data about the psychological nature of impairment and
its effect on the individual. On the issue of impairment Barnes makes two further clear points
about the Social Model. Barnes (1996) argues that since impairment is an individual experience
it cannot be a part of a social model, but that the
Social Model recognises its importance for the individual; it also notes the Medical
Model’s appropriation of individual impairments for the latter’s
own hegemony. Secondly, and more
significantly, Barnes (1998) has recently written that the Social Model:
is not a denial of the importance
of long-term illness or impairment(s), appropriate medical or psychological intervention
or, indeed, discussions of these experiences. Nor is it an assertion that once the various
barriers have been removed the problems associated with chronic illness or certain
types of impairment will disappear – they will not. And, contrary to recent assertions of
some disabled people and non-disabled writers (Crow 1996; Morris 1996), I have
never met anyone or read anything that suggested otherwise. (p.101)
The third way of Morris or Crow will not be addressed in this thesis as
it is neither sufficiently developed, nor does it yet have any foundation on a
theoretical basis significant enough to withstand strong criticism of the type
made by Barnes (1996; 1998). This
thesis would not argue that Morris and Crow’s perspective is neither invalid
nor that it is of no use for film studies on disability imagery in the future.
On the contrary, a third way that incorporates impairment and an awareness
of the individual’s experience of impairment would probably be most useful
in audience research and in assessing why a variety of images of disability may
be enjoyed by certain disabled people yet experienced as offensive by others. Equally, the audience’s perspective
is not explored here because this thesis is a purely textual analysis of the ideological
intent and content of specific films. The analysis will thus not incorporate the third way of Morris
and Crow, but the application of the Social Model of
disability to a selection of films. The
third way would be more applicable in other areas of investigation.
Equally, this thesis is not about the development or non-development of
disability theory, but it is concerned with the application of the very specific
Social Model of disability,
as developed and articulated by Oliver (1990; 1996) and others, to the films in
the thesis. It would not be helpful
in this thesis to seek an alternative analysis not based on the highly developed
and coherent Social Model.
Interestingly, disability politics seems to have followed a path similar
to that of feminist politics, yet has omitted the initial stage of mass discussion
and instead entered the academy directly. However, since it is my intention not to explore the comparative
developments of other theories of social construction but rather to examine the
application of the Social Model as a theory of the social construction
/ creation of impairment as disability to images of disability and impairment,
Shakespeare (1993; 1994; 1998) is recommended as a comparative work.
The following chapters are written within a framework of the Social
/ Medical Model dichotomy
which is prevalent within academy disability politics, from a Social Model perspective that interprets disability as entirely socially created and
constructed (constructed on film, in this case). The thesis is an exploration of the way disability (principally
within the Medical Model as identified by the
Social Model) works off, within, and into, popular culture's assessment
of what disability is: i.e., a personal tragedy theory (Oliver, 1990; 1996) that
makes the individual concerned both dependent and pathetic.
This is a perspective rooted in the institutional assumptions of impairment
as synonymous with disability and is therefore, as such, a perspective which deems
the impaired as being naturally pathological and inferior to the normal.
Institutional definitions
of disability create an ideology of disability as impairment, as, it will be argued,
do cinematic representations of disabled people. In using the term ‘ideology’
I mean that which Corr (1996) defines, using Althusser, as:
that
system of beliefs and assumptions - unconscious, unexamined, invisible - which
represents 'the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions
of existence' (Althusser, Ideology, 1971, p.162); but it is also
a system of practices that informs every aspect of daily life. Though it originates in particular cultural
conditions, it authorises its beliefs and practices as 'universal' and 'natural',
for instance, presenting ideas of health, illness and 'disease' not as cultural
constructs but as eternally and everywhere the same. (p.8)
The ideology of disability is perpetuated in popular culture by its representation
of impairment as disability in literature (Quicke, 1985), on television (Cumberbatch
and Negrine, 1992; Klobas, 1988), on film (Norden, 1994; Barnes, 1992), and on
the radio (Karpf, 1988). Unsurprisingly, current Western culture obtains many of its
ideas about the disabled from past representations and practices and from a variety
of cultures. Disability throughout
history has varied very little – it is usually negatively defined, and refined,
and very occasionally it is neutrally represented. However, since the period of the Enlightenment
(Stone, 1984; Barnes, 1992; Davis, 1995) it has invariably been represented as
pathological (in the Medical Model) rather
than anything connected with how society functions or is constructed (the Social
Model). For
a more detailed account of the influence of the Enlightenment on the impaired
body see Davis (1995), Mirzoeff (1995) and, of course, Foucault (1977).
There have been exceptions; ancient Egypt treated people with impairments
as equal with everyone else (Davis, 1995). Ancient Greece and Rome (Edwards, 1997),
on the other hand, advocated their extermination (except in the case of war veterans),
and Plato suggested that babies born with deformities should be left to die in
the sun or drowned (Barnes, 1996; Barnes, 1998; Garland, 1995; Albrecht, 1976).
The Old Testament of the Bible reinforced an ideology of negation for people
with impairments, particularly the lists in Leviticus and Deuteronomy of what
God finds abhorrent: lists aptly summarised by Douglas (1966, p.41) when she labels
Leviticus' list 'The Abominations of Leviticus', it is a list that included dwarfs,
the blind and the lame; indeed, descriptions that cover most ideas of what, or
who, is impaired / disabled. 'Sin'
and impairment are repeatedly shown as causally related in the Bible, so much
so that Luther advocated infanticide; he felt that impaired infants should be
beaten to death (to please God) as they were the devil's work (cf. Barnes, 1996; Abrams, 1998). The recent controversy (1999) over the
sacking of the England football team manager, Glenn Hoddle, is a clear indication
of the currency of such ideas (even though, one suspects the case in question
was exploited by non-disabled media professionals for other purposes).
Statistically, the highest number of people with impairments, and those
most disabled, are the elderly, yet impairment is considered in the popular consciousness
as predominantly affecting and afflicting the young (Oliver, 1991; Rojek et
al, 1988), especially within a legislative and
social work frame (Liachowitz, 1988; Vernon, 1993). Thus, the aged disabled are constructed differently, as being
natural (or logical), with state policies in place to make the ageing and aged
pay for their own disablement (i.e., pensions, etc. [Featherstone et al, 1991]).
Young people with an impairment, on the other hand, are constructed as
unnatural and thus suitable objects of charity, either state or voluntary (Hevey,
1992). The films discussed here, in this respect,
represent the ideological mystification of disability in our society, as disability
(as impairment) is indicated as being predominantly the preserve of the young
and the middle-aged.
One cannot, and should not, write about impairment and its social construction
without reference to the Nazis. Impairment, under the Nazis, was punished by death, with an
estimated half-a-million (intellectually and / or physically) disabled people
put to death because they had 'lives not worth living' or were classified as 'useless
eaters' (cf. Gallagher, 1990). An outline and analysis of the facts of this treatment can
be found in Poore's (1982) article 'Disability as Disobedience?' (cf. Proctor,
1988; Gallagher, 1990). Cinema in
Nazi Germany was a key instrument of the negative propaganda against its enemies
(Rentschler, 1996; Schulte-Sasse, 1996), including the disabled; its power of
persuasion through technique and mystification has, as such, always been recognised
in the negation of one group by or over another. The 1941 German, and Nazi-backed, film
Ich Klage An, directed by Wolfgang
Liebeneiner, is a good example. In
Ich Klage An a young woman contracts a condition similar
to Multiple Sclerosis and subsequently begs, successfully, for pro-active euthanasia
for the benefit of herself and the state.
Normality is itself a largely fascist concept: a controlling hegemony in
the interests of an élite – in normality’s case, a body elite
– of which the real power is imaginary rather than real (constructed rather
than natural). In Davis’ (1995)
view, normality is a concept that can be maintained (or even exist) only if the
abnormal and deviant are first labelled and isolated so as to compare one group
to another (Canguilhem, 1989) for a purpose other than mere classification.
Consequently, it is impossible to isolate the concepts of normality and
abnormality, either intellectually or physically, from any discussion of the treatment
or construction of 'disability' because normality is as equally constructed and
erroneous as are gender, race and abnormality (Davis, 1997; Thomsom, 1997; Shakespeare,
1998). As race and gender have their
own sets of 'norms' through which they are mediated (cf. Perkins, 1979, Butler, 1993; Cripps, 1977; Garland
Thomson, 1996) so does abnormality (disability). It is a perspective and philosophy –
the re-interpretation of body ‘norms’ - at the heart of Foucault’s
work (1977; 1978) and culture of medicine sociologists such as Turner (1991, 1992;
1995) and Featherstone et al (1991).
Just as there is a totally different meaning to the terms and implications
of sex and gender, so there is to impairment and disability
One must also consider, in exploring disability, that bio-medicine is premised
upon the idea(l) that there is a normal state to which an ill or impaired individual
can be brought back (normalised and / or rehabilitated) or banished from (defined
as sick or submitting to euthanasia). As such, there is at work in the ideology
of disability an ideology of normality, a concept at the heart of this project.
Such a premise (Higgins, 1985) may explain the non-malicious complicity
with which the medical profession has colluded in the negation through objectification
of those who do not fit that principle (Barnes and Mercer, 1995; Turner, 1991;
Turner, 1992; Turner, 1995) of normality.
Following this logic, implicit in the Social Model’s
analysis and its identification of Medical Model processes
(Barnes and Oliver, 1998), the abnormal are, if nothing else, a constant reminder
of the fallacy of normality that undermines any profession's claim to be its faithful
defender.
Disability is created in society out of the lives of the impaired, through
its many discursive practices in ideology, as 'life not worthy of life', 'dependent
and burdensome', predominantly 'suffered' by the young and understood as uniform
yet to varying degrees. Society, through ideology, generalises impairment as disability,
and to generalise is, as defined by the American Heritage Dictionary, 'to render indefinite or unspecific [ ... ] to reduce
to a general form, class or law' (cited in Modleski, 1991. p.52). The disability management policies of
most Western States to normalise the abnormal through integration can be seen
as having a three-fold purpose: firstly, to smooth out the contradictory evils
inherent in capitalism - make it seem benevolent rather than malevolent; secondly,
to be, as Douglas (1966) says of symbols,
used in ritual for the same ends as they are
used in poetry and mythology, to enrich meaning or to call attention to other
levels of existence. (p.40)
The third purpose is abstractly to define and create, through comparison,
normality through the creation of the abnormal, the disabled; with impairment
as disability being used in society to validate and classify as 'rich' a particular
style of life (predominantly white bourgeois 'able-bodiedness').
Cinematic representation of disability does not just validate able-bodiedness
due to the complex nature of all discourse, just as racist or homophobic images
are not only about being or not being black or gay; they are often about the nature
and structure of society as a whole.
This thesis will show how cinematic representations make visible these
purposes and ideologies, inadvertently revealing the discourses that support them.
If a society says this life
is good, it requires that life
which is bad to support such a philosophy. To make their point Utopias typically
requires Dystopia. Simply put, how
does one know what the good life is unless there are signs
of the bad life?
Society needs to generalise the Other, the bad life,
in order to use it for its own ideological and cultural purposes, which are to
emphasise the desirable norm. Disability,
or rather impairment, to varying degrees, does this in the films explored at the
core of this thesis.
In relation to Otherness in different academic disciplines I would, for
example, recommend the following further reading: the sociological work on stereotypes
by Oakes et al (1994); the work on ‘freaks’
by Garland Thompson (1996); the early feminist thoughts of Simone de Beauvoir
(1976), and the psychoanalytical theory of writers such as Lacan (1977), Kristeva
(1982) and Jordanova (1989).
In society, people with impairments are labelled disabled, i.e., people
who have had their impairments made significant through the social process and
institutional practices of creating disabled people out of people with impairments.
Hence, Oliver (1990, p.82) creates the additional new term ‘social
creation’ in addition to ‘social construction’ in relation to
disability, arguing that disability is created in the institutions of society
as much as the individual or collective ideologies which are shared in society. 'The disabled' are, then, within the Social Model, those
people with an impairment who have the shared social reality and construction
of being socially excluded, discriminated and labelled, on the basis of their
physical being. As such, in using
the Social Model, one cannot write or speak
of 'people with disabilities' (what is really meant is 'people with impairments')
but one can, and should, speak of 'disabled people'. From a methodology of the Social Model theory
the term ‘disabled people’ indicates a perspective of disability as
external to the people's bodies and that what 'disabled people' share is their
social exclusion rather than their impairments.
The Methodological Framework of the Thesis
Disabling ideologies and the control over the hegemony of normality firmly
place disability as pathological, rather than as the social construct that it
constitutes for the Social Model theory
of disability. Consequently, it is
quite logical that popular culture’s representations of disability offer
little that is different. This thesis aims to identify the connection
between the ideal world that entertainment offers in its representations of society
and culture, on the one hand, and the ideology of disability that creates the
impaired as pathologically disabled on the other.
The Social Model of
disability is rooted in proto-structuralist and materialist theories that de-construct
the pathologising tendency of the ideology of the Medical Model of
disability into a social constructionist analysis. This thesis, in using the methodological approach of the construction
of and representation of materialist analysis, which
is itself constructionist, brings together the two methods in order to demystify
disabling imagery. It offers a de-construction,
in a typically social constructionist methodology, to reveal how cinematic imagery
and its micro-elements (e.g., mise en scène) work to reinforce an ideology of disability as impairment.
By saying that disability is socially constructed and in using the Social
Model, this thesis is arguing that impairment in its social
corollary of disability can be accounted for in terms of social relations and
material processes (Shakespeare, 1998) rather than as a pathological reality,
or in any essentialist terms. This is at the core of the Social Model conception
of disability. The Social Model of disability is, equally, a methodological approach which theorises that
disability can be accounted for in terms of its social relations and material
processes (Gleeson, 1999; Johnstone, 1998) rather than as any essentialist reality.
Each methodological approach is often – very much so in relation
to the Social Model of disability as exemplified by Oliver and Barnes (1998) – rooted
in identifying the ideological implications of that which is being deconstructed
in material terms.
The Social Model of disability is a constructionist versus essentialist
explanation of the disability experience within society and culture (Gleeson,
1999; Shakespeare, 1998) in much the same way as is the dominant representational
paradigm, in a representation of methodology
(Hamilton, 1997); each perspective is fundamentally socially constructionist.
Equally, ideology in an Althusserian structuralist (proto-constructionist)
model of ideology is a methodology applied to the identification of various ideologies. The thesis demonstrates the connection
between the ideological and the micro-elements of cinematic technique through
detailed textual analysis of the core films studied herein.
The Social Model of disability is not specifically a structuralist
theory, given that it does not reduce the entire experience of disability to essential
macro-social phenomena, as some have claimed (Gleeson, 1999).
However, having said that, this thesis is not concerned with the complexities
of the Social Model per
se but its application in a coherent way to cinematic imagery using a constructionist
methodology. As such, the imagery
examined and the method of its examination are proto-structuralist, considered
genealogically, in its identification of its ideological content and support of
the essentialist philosophy of the Medical Model of
disability. At this point it must
be made clear that the Social Model of disability does not claim
for itself that it is the sole repository of knowledge about impairment, only
that it offers an insight into the nature of the socio-materialist factors affecting
the social construction of impairment as disability.
For Gleeson (1999) the materialist Social Model of
disability identifies disability as a social experience which:
‘arises from the specific
ways in which society organises its fundamental activities (i.e., work, transport,
leisure, education, domestic life). Attitudes, discourses and symbolic representations are, of
course, critical to the construction of this experience, but are themselves materialised
through the social practices which society undertakes [ … ].
[ … ]. Importantly, the social, rather than merely individual or even institutional,
creation of disability means that structural dynamics, such as production and
consumption relations and cultural outlooks, are implicated in its construction
and reproduction. (p.25)
It is, as Gleeson has identified above, even ‘cultural outlooks’
which play a part in the ‘construction and reproduction’ of disability.
This thesis identifies those cultural outlooks as exemplified in mainstream
cinema and its concomitant ideological implications. As Shakespeare (1994) has shown, along
with Gleeson (1999), Social Model theorists have neglected cultural
representations of disability and the part these play in the social construction
of disability. Consequently, it is
logical that the methodological approach used herein should take the construction
of / representation of school of cinematic de-mystification
as its theoretical basis because this school is fundamentally similar to that
of the Social Model of disability as revealed in
the work of Oliver and Barnes (1998). This
thesis is only the application of the Social Model of
disability to cinematic imagery of disability. The Social Model of disability has moved beyond
simple social constructionism to what Oliver (1990, p.80) calls social creationism;
a concept which moves forward from identifying disability as simply an attitudinal
problem within an ideology of individualism. Social creationism recognises the role
of institutions in creating a construction of a broader cultural range of subjects
through its discursive practices (i.e., disability, in this case).
This thesis, in using the Social Model of disability, identifies the cinematic constructions of disability as
impairment, and their role in the creation of impairment as disability.
Oliver (1990) writes that:
[t]he essential
difference between a social constructionist and a social creationist view of disability
centres on where the ‘problem’ is actually located.
Both views have begun to move away from the core ideology of individualism. The social constructionist view sees the problem as being located
within the minds of able-bodied people, whether individually (prejudice) or collectively,
through the manifestation of hostile social attitudes and the enactment of social
policies based upon a tragic view of disability.
The social creationist view, however, sees the problem as located within
the institutionalised practices of society.
(p.82)
Each term is closely entwined with notions of ideology and individualism,
meaning that social creationists, as Oliver sees himself, see the ‘spread’
of creative influences as greater and more
widespread. As such, the institutional
practices of mainstream cinema are included as a whole (rather than individual
ideological prejudice) within the social constructionist methodology that Oliver
is labelling social creationist (a broader, more inclusive methodology within
a social constructionist paradigm). The difference between the creationist
and constructionist perspective, in relation to this thesis, is that the social
creationist bent of the Social Model of
disability is applied to institutional cultural practices as a social construction
(e.g., mainstream cinema). As a social construction, it thus facilitates the Social
Model application of disability as a notion of social construction / creation
to mainstream cinema – the essential nature of this thesis. As Althusser (1984) has said, every theory
must pass through a descriptive phase into a stage where a means to identify and
recognise the facts of oppression are made; Chapters Two, Three and Four are intended
to constitute such a passing.
Oliver, the father of Social Model of disability theory,
in all of his work (1990; 1996; and, with Barnes, 1998) is explicitly concerned
with notions of ideology and hegemony in the social creation of disability.
Following on from Althusser’s view that society is constituted by
levels or instances articulated by a specific determination such as politico-legal
and ideological, Oliver sees disability constituted (created in its construction)
by instances and levels of articulation.
Oliver himself states that cultural images support the ‘ideology
of individualism [ … ] heavily influenced by the medical profession’
(1990, p.62). By including the ideology
of individualism this thesis identifies other factors that have played a part
in supporting the role of the family, the body, stereotypes and archetypes through
employing cultural images which seem to confirm them and make them appear natural.
Implicit within these images is an ideology that is mainstream as much
as it is disability specific (i.e., the family).
This thesis identifies mainstream cinema’s use of various constructionist
ideologies of mainstream society in creating perfect worlds for entertainment
(familial, stereotypical / archetypal, and corporeal).
Oliver (1990) sees individualism as a key ideology in the construction
and creation of disability in the Medical Model of
disability as a personal tragedy.
Thus, in the Social Model of disability, a fundamental
role is to identify the ideology of individualism in practice – as is shown
herein. Oliver’s view of ideology
is similar to Althusser’s in that it is ‘a set of values or beliefs
underpinning social practices, whether those social practices be the work process,
medical intervention or the provision of welfare services’ (Oliver, 1990,
p.43). Oliver goes one step further
though to differentiate between what Gramsci calls ‘organic’ and ‘arbitrary’
ideologies and hegemony (ibid).
Oliver renames the organic and arbitrary ideologies as core and peripheral.
Individualism is an organic and core ideology whilst medicalisation and
normality are arbitrary and peripheral to individualism.
As such the thesis is about identifying the arbitrary ideologies implicit
within the texts analysed below – normalisation, medicalisation, and relationships
- and linking them to the organic ideologies of society such as individualism
and the familial. In Chapter Two,
the difference between a stereotype and archetype of disability is articulated
to indicate their roles in various elements of ideology or, to be more precise,
the hegemony of disability as impairment and its significance to society at all
levels and instances. As Oliver writes
(1990):
[t]he hegemony that defines disability in capitalist society is constituted
by the organic ideology of individualism, the arbitrary ideologies of medicalisation
underpinning medical intervention and personal tragedy theory underpinning much
social policy. Incorporated also
are ideologies related to concepts of normality, able-bodiedness and able-mindedness.
(p.44)
This thesis identifies the micro factors of cinema such as camera, lighting
and editing, and other more specific elements of mise en scène, to identify in various ideologies the hegemony of
normality - through individualism as exemplified by medicalisation at work - in
the films studied in detail in the following chapters. I do not explore bio-medicine as a theoretical
framework in itself; as has already been said of other theories, this thesis only
refers to it (and other linked theoretical aspects) in passing as part of my examination
of medicalisation in reference to the disabling ideologies of the films examined.
Much of what is argued about the films studied in this thesis could equally
be claimed about the plays, books and other media from which the films discussed
in detail come. Indeed, much of what
is claimed about these texts could be argued as applicable to most images of disability;
that is why those chosen are indicative films. Even though I have chosen only a select
few images to examine in detail, the results achieved are equally applicable to
the same narratives in other media and other narratives of a similar theme in
the same and other media. What I
do show in the thesis, by looking at the core films chosen, is the cinematic specificities
of mainstream classic narrative cinema style, technique and form that contribute
to the construction, the creation, of disability as an individualised personal
tragedy rather than as anything else (identified through the application of the
Social Model of
disability).
One final point to be made prior to addressing the films chosen for examination
concerns the concepts of normalisation and ideology. Althusser (1984) has identified that various ideologies and
ideological state apparatuses (familial, medical, et cetera) may
appear to be disparate, but that beneath them all is the ideology of the dominant
ruling culture and class. It is the
ideology of individualism which is dominant in both mainstream cinema and the
Medical Model of disability and I
use this thesis to identify these and other ideologies which support a dominant
cultural and class ideology of individualism: i.e., medicalisation, normality,
familial, able-bodiedness and health. I
also identify the role played by stereotypes and archetypes in such an ideological
role. The seemingly contradictory
ideological content about disability is revealed as being ideologically coherent,
through examination of the two contradictory notions of euthanasia and normalisation
identified in the various films examined. It must be remembered that normalisation
is ‘a theory of services not of disability’ (Oliver and Barnes, 1998,
p.52). Normalisation is a service
controlled by professionals which enabled them to retain a key role in their delivery,
ensuring the adaptation of the medical profession in the era of deinstitutionalisation
and the new community-based services provision and practices (ibid). The
final chapter of the thesis, in looking at the body, deals extensively with normalisation.
The films examined
offer a clear revelation of how films about disability represent and construct
core and peripheral ideologies in relation to their discourse around disability.
Equally, disability discourse (the construction of impairment as disability)
is often utilised in support of other core and peripheral ideologies. These are ideologies such as family, health and notions of
success and failure, as well as the obvious ones of individualism and medicalisation
of the everyday, let alone disability, which affect the whole of society.
I do not set myself apart from ideology – unlike Althusser - as the
only individual able to recognise it; far from it: we all live within ideologies
that mediate our daily lives. Althusser
(1984) argues that ideology is a necessary component of human society, and Comolli
and Narboni (1999, p.755) further
argue that ‘the tools and techniques of film-making are a part of ‘reality’
themselves, and furthermore ‘reality’ is nothing but an expression
of the prevailing ideology’. There
is no escaping the omnipresent nature of ideology, but that does not stop its
being identified where it is identifiable – easily or inadvertently.
Equally, I acknowledge that I write from a position of situated knowledge,
a particular standpoint that is intrinsically linked to my socio-cultural position
in society as a disabled person in a disabling society.
My situated position, which is a disabled standpoint, is not unlike that
which, in relation to women feminist writers, Harding (1983, p.184) identifies
and labels as the ‘the feminist standpoint’; a perspective that often
utilised ‘feminist empiricism’ to great effect and for improved clarity. I do have a ‘disabled standpoint’
and do, indeed, use ‘disabled empiricism’ in this thesis; I only hope
that is effective and clearly additional to the fundamental constructionist methodology
used here.
The Core Films of the Thesis
The films chosen have been selected on the basis that they are, in the
main, an indicative selection representative of a wider number of films that explore
and represent impairment / disability as part of their core diegetic structure.
They have impairment as the main thematic thrust of their narratives which,
in turn, makes them ideal as they offer a wealth of nuances and differences in
representation. Other films which could have been selected
for examination on the basis that disability / impairment is highly visible within
them often have disability to heighten or validate a plot structure that is either
generic or fundamentally weak. For example, the use of visual impairment
in films such as, for example, Blind Terror (Richard
Fleischer, GB, 1971), Cat O’Nine Tails (Dario
Argento, Italy, 1971), Jennifer 8 (Bruce
Robinson, US, 1992) and Blink (Michael
Apted, US, 1994) is not about the exploration of visual impairment itself.
Rather, these films use visual impairment to create a motivational point,
plot push or scenario in the ‘woman in peril’ / thriller genre form. The same is true of the use of various impairments in other
genre and mainstream films as diverse as The Spiral Staircase (Robert
Siodmak, US, 1945), Crescendo (Alan
Gibson, GB, 1969), Bad Day at Black Rock (John
Sturges, US, 1955), Jobman (D. Roodt, S. Africa,
1990), Dolores Claiborne (Taylor Hackford, US, 1995),
A Clockwork Orange (Stanley Kubrick, GB, 1971)
and The Secret Garden (Agnieszka Holland, US, 1993).
As there are, quite literally, hundreds to choose from I recognise that,
in the end, any selection is rather arbitrary.
However, this is an arbitrary situation which makes those films chosen
as indicative (or not) as any other selection or choices of films.
This is not to say that these films do not use the same ideological assumptions
about disability to create their effect; they often have to for the characters
to imply all that they do, given their superficiality as characters. A good example of this is a scene in Carlito’s
Way (Brian de Palma, US, 1993) in which the film’s
lead character, played by Al Pacino, is betrayed by an old friend.
The betrayal is motivated – as well as being a development of the
narrative - by Carlito’s friend now being in a wheelchair.
It is a short scene in which one of Carlito’s friends, until then
presumed to be imprisoned, visits him in order to tape Carlito admitting to current
illegal activity. In the scene this
particular friend, who is now in a wheelchair, finally breaks down upon being
caught by Carlito in his deception. He tells Carlito that he only agreed to carry out the deception
because as a wheelchair user his life is now ‘fucked’, and his only
way out of prison was to agree to be wired for deception purposes to implicate
Carlito. No lengthy characterisation
is given for the change from friend to foe other than the fact that the friend
is now in a wheelchair and, as such, his life is, in his own term, ‘fucked’.
The wheelchair is the characterisation and total, complete explanation
in itself. It is, as Jameson (1992)
says, always already read; acculturation into what disability is deemed to be
ensures that the logic of the narrative is clear without undue explanation.
The films chosen are from the social issue school of
film-making. It is appropriate here
to quote from Hill (1986) whose comments apply to my chosen selection of films
when he writes that:
Although such a bare listing undoubtedly
under-emphasises the variations in style and tone between films, what justifies
their common grouping is their concern to raise topical social issues within a
commercial cinematic form. They are, in effect, all examples of the [ … ] ‘social
problem’ film and it is through them that many of the dominant ideological
assumptions and attitudes of the period can be revealed.
(p.67)
Obviously the social issue is in the singular rather than the plural for
my selection, i.e., the ideological assumptions that I identify and discuss are
around physical disability. The selection
could have included many other films from a variety of formal styles, including
a significant number of British-made films (co-)funded by Channel 4 or the BBC;
films such as Walter - and its sequel Walter
and June (Stephen Frears, GB, 1982/3), Journey to Knock (David Wheatley, GB, 1991), Frankie Starlight (Michael
Lindsey-Hogg, US/GB, 1995), Go Now (Michael
Winterbottom, GB, 1996) and Sixth Happiness (Waris
Hussein, GB, 1997). Equally, the selection could have included many other conventional
mainstream films that have as a theme impairment. Films as diverse as: The Dark Angel (Sidney Franklin, US, 1935); The Stratton Story
(Sam Wood, US, 1949); On Dangerous Ground (Nicholas
Ray, US, 1951); A Patch of Blue (Guy
Green, US, 1965); Midnight Cowboy (John Schlesinger, US,
1969); Young Frankenstein (Mel Brooks, US, 1974);
Cutters Way (Ivan Passer, US, 1981); and Passion Fish (John
Sayles, US, 1992). The resulting
thesis would have been the same; the same ideological content would have been
found within limited variation given the time-span in which the films have all
been made.
The six films selected for close textual analysis in the thesis are: A
Day In The Death Of Joe Egg (Peter Medak, GB, 1970); The
Raging Moon (Bryan Forbes, GB, 1970); The Elephant Man
(David
Lynch, US/GB, 1980); Whose Life Is It Anyway? (John
Badham, GB/US, 1981); Duet For One (Andrei Konchalovsky,
GB, 1987); and My Left Foot (Jim Sheridan, GB, 1989). These
six films have been selected because they have around the subject of disablement
seemingly different perspectives that affect their construction. This means that although on the surface
the ideology is quite different, fundamentally they all reduce disability to impairment
and reinforce the Medical Model of disability; the following
chapters show how this is achieved. For example, The Raging Moon is
very much in favour of institutionalisation whilst My Left Foot is
not; whilst Duet For One is not for euthanasia per
se whereas Whose Life Is It Anyway? is.
The films chosen do have different perspectives around disability in their
narratives that cover the period in which they were made (and which are all still
relevant today). The primary aim of the thesis is to identify
the films’ different ideologies as well as their apparent differences, and
to take account of both of these aspects within the eras within which they were
made. The thesis will show that the
films chosen vary very little in ideological content, given their superficial
differences in perspective, time of making and trans-national construction.
The additional aims of the thesis are a) to identify the various disabling
ideologies within the six films, b) to identify their differences in respect of
a) and, finally, c) to place these within the social and political context of
the hegemony of the contemporary MedicalModel through
the application of the Social Model of
disability.
If I were to be starting the thesis now I would include other films from
non-English-speaking countries, films that have been interesting in a number of
ways. However, most of them would
leave the basic thesis of this work unchallenged. These films include Poulet au Vinaigre (Claude
Chabrol, France, 1984), Accion Mutante (Alex
de la Iglesia, Spain, 1995), The Eighth Day (Jaco
Van Dormael, Belgium, 1996), Live Flesh (Pedro
Almodóvar, Spain, 1997), Hana Bi (Takeshi
Kitano, Japan, 1997) and many others.
The issues raised in the films selected are as relevant today as ever.
Euthanasia is now a major social issue that is developing daily; institutionalisation
is still a big issue for disabled people (Oliver and Barnes, 1998). Normalisation is still at the heart of many disability strategies
and policies now coming on stream (Oliver and Barnes, 1998; Drake, 1999) from
a range of Western states. Moreover,
the films chosen reflect my own life experience as well as being products of the
same Western culture that I inhabit. I will, therefore discuss them with occasional
reference to any special insights, from a ‘situated knowledge’ position,
that I can bring to them as a disabled person myself.
Indeed, it is the differing reactions of people I know – disabled
and non-disabled – who saw the films upon their initial release that led
to my own subsequent desire to conduct this current research.
Each film offers the audience an apparently real interpretation of the
lived experience of supposedly 'real' people (whether fictional or actual people),
whilst at the same time trying to have a perspective and / or original viewpoint
that comments upon reality. Each
film tries stylistically to approximate reality in order ‘to show things
as they really are’ (cited in Hill, 1986, p.57), as Raymond Williams on |