Abnormality: The Definition Of Normality

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When we use the word normal to describe someone, some may take it to mean that they are valid while others may take it to mean that they are bland and not special. Depending on the context, it can mean either of those things. Normality cannot exist without its counterpart, abnormality. Abnormality can simply refer to something that is different, something that is uncommon or unconventional but many times there are certain connotations associated with different words synonymous to abnormal. Words such as extraordinary, eccentric, or exceptional all have positive connotations that when used to describe something or someone, is meant to put that thing or person on a pedestal. However descriptors such as strange, queer, and bizarre are taken to …show more content…
It is a very powerful social construct intended to create a hierarchy and justify discriminatory acts against people who are not normal. The meaning of normality is quite difficult to pinpoint as there is no consensus among the general public as to what the word really means or what constitutes normality. It is subjective in that everyone has a different set of criteria that constitutes normality but it can also be seen as objective as it is common to associate normality with beauty and functionality. If a body part does not function the way that it does for most people and if it hinders completing certain tasks, it is seen as a disability. And in the absence of beauty, things and people become ugly. Just as abnormality is the counterpart to normality, disability and ugliness is the analogous counterpart to ability and beauty respectively. These categories however can illicit strong responses towards them. It is how society perceives abnormality, disability, and ugliness that create marginalization of these minority …show more content…
This flawless individual in Western society is best represented by a white, heterosexual, Christian man of the middle class. However far removed someone is from that ideal is a measure of their abnormality and of their inferiority. This is supported by the treatment of non-normal people by those in power, an example being institutionalized racism. In Gloria Anzaldúa’s The Borderlands / La Frontera, she recounts of a time when she was berated for speaking Spanish in school. She was told to “speak American...if [she] want[ed] to be American,” (76). Phrases like these perpetuate the idea that it is not normal for Americans to speak Spanish or that to be American is to be Anglo Saxon. Upon designation of the term American being strictly synonymous to Anglo Saxon, those who do not meet that criterion are seen as other. There exists a power imbalance between the core and the periphery when we think of abnormality as wrong. But why do some people associate abnormality with inferiority? If your body is not like mine, if it does not function like mine, and if you do not think like me, then you are invalid. Such beliefs are very harmful. However, what constitutes normal at a certain place and time will not hold true forever. Before colonialism, the majority of the population living in present-day Mexico were Indigenous people and therefore it was of the norm to speak Indigenous Mexican languages. This shift in

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