CRIPPING THE WORKSPACE: PERFORMING PHYSICALLY DISABLED PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY IN PERSONAL NARRATIVE

CRIPPING THE WORKSPACE: PERFORMING PHYSICALLY DISABLED PROFESSIONAL IDENTITY IN PERSONAL NARRATIVE

By Julie-Ann Scott

Thesis Advisor: Dr. Kristin Langellier

A Lay Abstract of the Dissertation Presented

in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the

Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

(Interdisciplinary in Communication)

May, 2010

This study is a performance of identity analysis of 26 physically disabled professionals’ personal narratives. Performance methodology argues that cultural meanings, truths, identities and understandings (such as societal stigma of different identity groups) are created through such as those with physical disabilities, are created through human interactions, and can be challenged and changed through new conversations.

Across interviews, participants explained that anxiety surfaces during their interactions with their colleagues, compelling their peers to see them as ‘super heroes’ who have triumphed over adversity, ‘warrior heroes’ engaged in the fight for disabled people’s rights, tragic heroes that are unjustly suffering pain, or anti-heroes who should not be allowed to remain in the professional environment. I argue that these ‘hero characters’ are not manifestations of the physically disabled employees’ personal characters. Rather, they are created within professional interactions because of the stigma surrounding disability.

Narrators also struggled with their own understandings of what it means to be physically disabled, at times dismissing it, seeing it as a means of personal fulfillment, and a disruption of their potential ‘true selves’. Within these stories, physical disability manifested as a reminder of the vulnerability of all human bodies, reminding us that we all understand disability enough to admire, question, fear and/or avoid disability because it is the crystallization of our shared mortality. At times, narrators’ blurred their public and private lives, performing how physical disability at times diminished and intensified their gender and sexual identities (compelling those around them to desire and/or reject them) within and beyond the workplace.  As stigmatized, deemed atypical bodies, physically disabled people potentially interact from a state of ‘hyper-embodiment’ in which they are continually reminded of the implications of their bodies in others (and their own) understandings of their identities. In turn, their personal stories offer a means to highlight the complexities of mortal human embodiment that people whose bodies are not stigmatized by society may not be aware. Through analyzing how physically disabled people navigate the workforce we can gain insight of how to create policies that adapt with the inevitability of changing bodies.