#WordyandWheelyWednesdays: Sonnets for my Sanity

Hello my dear readers and welcome to yet another #WordyandWheelyWednesdays post where I'm writing about something different from what I expected to be. (This seems to be becoming a habit!)

Those of you who know me 'in real life' will most likely be aware that I write poetry. Often, especially when I'm stressed or need a more structured emotional outlet, this poetry takes the form of sonnets. In an effort to honour the pledge I made in last week's post (but have been working on for some time) to be more celebratory of my difference, I have found myself writing them more regularly. Indeed, over the last little while, what I thought was a sporadic smattering of verses usually penned in breaks from PhD work has become a more substantial project. Still only in breaks from my PhD, mind you, but more than just the occasional verse.

These poems have allowed me time to reflect on my thesis, my body, and the way that these two things are inextricably intertwined yet also almost mutually destructive - and I've come to rely on their fourteen lines as a slice of sanity in a cake that can sometimes feel as if it's filled with nothing but confusion and chaos. So much so that I now have quite a few, and I plan to keep going.

I'm not quite sure where they'll all end up, but may publish some on here, if that would be of interest?

Let me know - for now, though, I'm just sending love and thanks to you all for putting up with my ponderings - and offering you the picture below, which is my desktop background, and represents my 'mind's eye'! Pretentious, moi!?

Copyright Jessi Parrott 2015-

  

#WordyandWheelyWednesdays: UKDHM 2016

Logo used with permission of UKDHM organisers

[Image description: The banner and logo for UK Disability History Month/UKDHM. On the left side of the image there is a black triangle which has a yellow circle inside it. The circle contains the words, 'UK Disability History Month', which are in black capitalised font. Stretching out across the page next to the logo, there is a yellow elongated rectangle, which functions as a banner. Inside this banner, to the immediate right of the logo, there are three bulleted statements, one underneath the other. These read as follows: 'Celebrating our Lives, Challenging Disablism, Achieving Equality', On the very right edge of the banner, there are the dates 22nd November-22nd December, which indicate the four weeks covered by UKDHM. Underneath the logo/banner is a caption to indicate that I have permission to use it from the organisers.]

(Content Warning for: brief discussion of disability oppression and discrimination/ableism, but this post is mostly proud and positive.)

Hello my dear readers!

This wasn't the post I had planned to write this week, as it was going to be about a research-related discovery, but then I remembered that I would be attending the launch event for UK Disability History Month (UKDHM) 2016 last night - so obviously I had to write about that!

UKDHM is a fairly recent iniative, although it has been a long time in the making. Started in 2010 by a group of veteran disability campaigners and activists, it aims to offer a chance to remember disability history, to discuss 'disability present' and to secure 'disability future(s)' in the UK and beyond. Now in its seventh year, it has taken the theme of 'Disability and Language', which revolves around an education pack about the impact of language in conversations about disability and the potential harm of slurs. This is a subject about which I feel very passionate (as those of you who know me will be well aware) so I was extremely excited to attend.

It was an absolutely lovely evening. Difficult at points, especially when discussions turned to the current policies of austerity and their accompanying attitudes, but mostly lovely. There were extremely interesting presentations, some hugely powerful poetry (including contributions from Maresa MacKeith, a radical poet who communicates without speech), and a deliciously provocative play by members of the theatre company Access All Areas. Of course it was also wonderful to catch up with friends, some of whom only manage to meet once a year but whom I hold very dear. (I've just realised that rhymes, which was completely unintentional but is rather apt!)

I found the issues around language absolutely fascinating - not least because of their complexity. What struck me most during the discussion was that there wasn't always a clear consensus on terminology. For instance, whilst the predominant phrasing in public policy (and therefore every day vocabulary) refers to us as 'people with disabilities', the preferred term for most of the presenters was 'disabled people'. The former is an example of 'person-first language', which asserts personhood aside from anything else. The latter is an example of 'identity-first' language which posits (surprisingly!) that community identity is paramount. It's also an integral aspect of the 'social' model of disability, which suggests that disability arises from social barriers. This was developed in response to the 'individual' model (now more usually referred to as the 'medical' model), which locates disability as a solely individual issue. 

Somewhat against the grain, I have always preferred the person-first approach, and term myself as a 'person with a disability'. I am very much in agreement with the social model, as there is absolutely no doubt about the social barriers my friends and I encounter on a daily basis but, especially in more recent years, I cannot help but be aware of the impact my body has on my abilities - both negatively and positively. So, for me, the best model is the (seemingly elusive) middle ground between the 'social' and 'individual' - and I find it personally easier to articulate that with the phrase 'person with a disability', especially because my being 'disabled' isn't the only aspect of my identity. I thought I was alone in this opinion but, having read my friend Sarah's thoughtful post after the event (read it here), it seems I'm not!

This isn't to say I won't ever feel comfortable reclaiming the word 'disabled'. After all, I used to hate the word 'cripple' and wouldn't have dreamt I'd now be using its shortened form, 'crip', as a badge of honour - but I am! Indeed, I think the concepts of honour and pride in relation to disability were my two most important takeaways from yesterday. In theory, of course, they were things I already knew. In practice, however, I don't think I've thus far been very good at expressing them - and definitely not in relation to myself!

Yesterday reminded me (exactly when I needed to be) that I am valuable and worthy just as I am. I remembered that I can celebrate my difference just as much as I celebrate others' - and that it is necessary for me to do so. So, over the next four weeks, I'm going to employ this little corner of the internet as an assistant for my personal project of self-acceptance. I'm not quite sure what form that will take just yet, but hopefully you'll follow along and we can find out together!

For now, much love, and Happy UKDHM!

Jxx

#WordyandWheelyWednesdays: Busy Bunny

Hello dear readers

Just a short, silly post tonight as this Parrott is very busy bunny with work...so here's a bunny for you, though it may be hard to spot:

 nn
(oo)
(uu)* 

(Normal service shall resume next week!)

Jx

#WordyandWheelyWednesdays: Worried but not Weary

(Content Warning for: discussions of bigotry, hatred and discrimination towards minority groups, both in our current era and historically, and the impact of politics)

My dear readers,

I must ask you to forgive me on two counts - the fact that I've missed two weeks of this series (due to a combination of ill health and a lot of work), and the fact that this week's update is a day late - but I'm still calling it #WordyandWheelyWednesdays since, well, it's about Wednesday.

Actually, I'm not going to apologise for its lateness, because a) it was my Mama's birthday and b) I needed to take some time to process what happened in global politics. As of yesterday, on the strength of a campaign that seemed more like a reality TV show than a bid for political office, Donald Trump is now the forty-fifth President Elect of America. Being a young bisexual woman and a wheelchair user, the fact that I just had to type that sentence terrifies me. I wept in the shower yesterday morning, despite trying desperately hard not to on account of Mama's birthday.

Why? You might ask. You're British and you live in the UK. Yes, so I didn't have a vote (and arguably anything that he enacts during his - hopefully only four-year - term won't have a direct effect on me), but that doesn't preclude me having concerns. 

I'm worried about my friends in America.

I'm worried for the couples who might lose their right to marry, as quickly as they (only recently) won it.

I'm worried for the women, female-identifying and non-binary people who might lose their right to safe bodily autonomy through access to legally-available contraceptives and terminations. 

I'm worried about the impact of the campaign's overtones of rape culture.

I'm worried for the people who may feel too unsafe to practise their religion(s), for fear of reprisal.

I'm worried for the people who might lose the access to health insurance that they were granted through the Affordable Care Act (otherwise known as ObamaCare) - especially those with pre-existing conditions deemed uninsurable by most companies.

I'm worried that, in the UK, our goverment chose this week (probably liking the cover of the US election) to announce changes to caps in the benefit system that will have a disproportionate effect on families and disabled people.

I'm worried that our Prime Minister did not mention or caution against any of the potential human rights issues of this presidency in her statement congratulating Trump.

I'm worried that people will consider this election as a justification for all kinds of hatred - racism, Islamaphobia, anti-Semitism, misogyny, homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, ableism, and every other sort of bigotry they could possibly invent.

I'm worried because the only other reference point I have for the scenes the media have captured at Trump's rallies are from the clips we watched in history lessons on Hitler - and from there, along with the more obvious minority groups, disabled people like me were forced to wear black triangles, rounded up for the purposes of medical experimentation and then killed in concentration camps (if, of course, we didn't die during the experiments). 

I'm worried that it could happen again.

Perhaps that last point seems a little drastic or farfetched to you. We've learnt many things since then! you might say - and largely I would agree with the sentiment. People in the 1930s thought Hitler's ambitions were drastic and farfetched, though - and, in 1948, the same year as the United Nations was formed with the aim of preventing similar atrocities, the Apartheid regime took power in South Africa.

That isn't to say I think it will happen again - the fact that the popular vote went to Hillary Clinton and that there has been such sadness and outrage at the result both in America and across the world shows that there are enough people and organisations who will work against the despicable rhetoric. Of course Clinton is far from perfect, especially in relation to foreign policy and military strategy - and the whole neoliberal project falls way short of being truly inclusive and intersectional. 

Yet this is where we (those of us in this world who believe in equality and equity) come in - and this is where I moved from worry to wakefulness. This election, particularly in combination with Brexit, has understandably filled many of us with difficult feelings that it is important to acknowledge - but it can also be taken as a reminder that reform is deeply necessary. If we can harness the surge of emotion and turn it into something useful instead of despairing, we can and will make change. 

A dear friend was recently in Brussels and sent me a photograph of a T-shirt she spotted in a shop window. The picture is a bit obscured due to the reflection, so I will include it below anyway, but also provide a description. It is red and has a drawing on it of a beautiful black woman with an afro - and underneath a quotation from the black activist Angela Y Davis: 'I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I am changing the things I cannot accept…'

I think we can all learn a lot from this philosophy. It is essentially at the heart of my thesis, but it is all very well writing about things in theory. The USA and the UK are both democracies so we cannot necessarily change the way that the recent votes have fallen, but it does not mean that we have to accept the language and atmosphere of bigotry and intolerance. Therefore we must act, in ways seemingly small as well as big, because if we do not it is tantamount to approbation of this negativity - which is almost worse.

So, in the spirit of salvaging something from the sewerage of 2016, I am grateful that I have family, friends and colleagues who I know will read this ramble and join with me to do things differently, not just in relation to our research, but in real terms. Anger and optimism could be a powerful combination - let's try it out!

For now, I love you all. Thank you for being in my life.