Pimp my walker

Writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer(Sunday, Sept. 24, 2006), Melissa Dribben reports on the broader implications of “disability chic” in “Pimp my walker”:

“It falls into the category of positive identity, like African American dreads,” says Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, director of graduate studies in the Women’s Studies department of Emory University [and participating in this conference].  “The wheelchair, for example, used to be a medical thing that grandmothers used. . .” As evidenced in Murderball, the 2005 film about quadriplegic rugby players, she says, the chairs may be viewed now as extremely cool, high-tech sports equipment. Garland-Thomson cites the success of fashion model, actress and NCAA athlete Aimee Mullins as a measure of the rise of disability chic. “To transfer disability from Jerry Lewis’ telethon and charity posters to quad rugby and Aimee Mullins is to really move it into a different cultural space.”

“The border between people with disabilities and those without is the most permeable of all,” says Garland-Thomson, who was born with foreshortened arms and missing fingers.  “People who are not disabled can become disabled in an instant.  It is an identity available to all of us at all times.”