“Integrating Disability, Transforming Feminist Thought” by Rosemarie Garland-Thomson takes a disability studies approach to redefining how we think of identity in a feminist context. Written in 2002, this piece neatly falls into what could be classified as a staple of Third Wave Feminism, in that it takes a more intersectional approach, considering not only how disability factors in with an individual’s sense of self, but also how it interacts with other areas of a person’s life. Specifically, Garland-Thomson frames this as a struggle between one’s disability and their femininity. As mentioned several times throughout her piece, this analysis also credits itself heavily to the Civil Rights and Disability Rights movements of the 1960’s, as well
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Specifically explored is the idea of how cultural implications of disability affect how disabled individuals make choices concerning their appearance, medication, and even how they structure their lives. Garland-Thomson once again ties together ideas of femininity and disability when considering the idea of surgeries. It’s not only the disabled that are pressured into having surgeries they don’t necessarily need for appearance purposes. Rather, there’s “tremendous social pressures to shape, regulate, and normalize [all] subjugated bodies (Garland-Thomson 10),” including those who don’t fit the norms of femininity, age, weight, and beauty. This results in a question for this disabled as to where the line is drawn between reconstructive and cosmetic surgery (10). Many more medical concerns are discussed, such as immediate surgery for intersexed infants, euthanasia, conjoined twins, and selective abortion. There’s such a push to ensure that individuals who don’t meet the norm, who are viewed as having some sort of disability solely from their state of being, take drastic measures, that the very concept that we’re somehow “preventing struggling” or “creating well-adjusted individuals (10)” remains unquestioned. Garland-Thomson concludes this section by claiming that “oppressive attitudes towards disability distort the possibility of unbiased free choice (16),” further emphasizing the lack of agency available in defining one’s own identity when disabled because of such monumental cultural
Specifically explored is the idea of how cultural implications of disability affect how disabled individuals make choices concerning their appearance, medication, and even how they structure their lives. Garland-Thomson once again ties together ideas of femininity and disability when considering the idea of surgeries. It’s not only the disabled that are pressured into having surgeries they don’t necessarily need for appearance purposes. Rather, there’s “tremendous social pressures to shape, regulate, and normalize [all] subjugated bodies (Garland-Thomson 10),” including those who don’t fit the norms of femininity, age, weight, and beauty. This results in a question for this disabled as to where the line is drawn between reconstructive and cosmetic surgery (10). Many more medical concerns are discussed, such as immediate surgery for intersexed infants, euthanasia, conjoined twins, and selective abortion. There’s such a push to ensure that individuals who don’t meet the norm, who are viewed as having some sort of disability solely from their state of being, take drastic measures, that the very concept that we’re somehow “preventing struggling” or “creating well-adjusted individuals (10)” remains unquestioned. Garland-Thomson concludes this section by claiming that “oppressive attitudes towards disability distort the possibility of unbiased free choice (16),” further emphasizing the lack of agency available in defining one’s own identity when disabled because of such monumental cultural