Disability in Media
Lynne Roper of Stirling Media Research Institute introduces some concepts and activities for considering the representation of disability.

Introduction
At the time of writing, there are many images of disability in the British media, not least because of TV and press news images of injuries associated with the Iraq War. But even outside wartime, everyday press imagery - and TV documentary in particular (especially on Five) - demonstrates that there is a cultural obsession with disability.

It could be seen as positive that disabled people are not hidden away. But a closer analysis reveals that the popular cultural images of disability commonly perpetuate negative stereotypes, and often pander to the voyeuristic tendencies of non-disabled audiences. An excellent way of beginning to challenge such images is by considering the social model of disability.

This article outlines the sociology of disability and then suggests a range of approaches to media representations of disability. Any or all of these approaches can be used and developed depending on the interest of the teacher, their links to other issues in media studies, and the availability of texts. I have suggested certain media texts as particularly useful, but these are not always readily available, and numerous others can easily be used in their place.

Dominant notions of disability: the individual model
The societal view of disability generally conforms to the individual or overcoming or medical model of disability. This holds that disability is inherent in the individual, whose responsibility it is to ‘overcome’ her or his ‘tragic’ disability.
Often this ‘overcoming’ is achieved through medical intervention, such as attempts at ‘cures’. For example, top wheelchair athlete Tanni Grey-Thompson was forced as a child to wear heavy leg callipers which gave her blisters, rather than being offered the simple and practical option of using a wheelchair.
This approach to disability aims for the normalisation of disabled people, often through the medicalisation of their condition.

The social model of disability
This distinguishes between impairment (the concrete physical or mental state) and disability (the socio-cultural construct). It holds that impairments are not inherently disabling, but that disability is caused by society which fails to provide for people with impairments, and which puts obstacles in their way.
Examples include access: the built environment often does not allow access for people with mobility problems. Discriminatory attitudes are also disabling: for example, the idea that disability is a personal tragedy for the ‘sufferer’ impinges upon disabled people in a variety of negative ways, from their social relationships to their ability to get jobs.
Disability is produced in different forms, and in different proportions, in different cultures (Oliver, 1996). Factors such as industrialisation and wars impact on the types and extents of impairments.
The ways in which disability is viewed in a culture are also dependent on factors such as religion and capitalism. Some religions will see epilepsy as possession by a god and therefore a gift, whereas in capitalist western societies where medicine is powerful, disability acts as evidence of the failure of medicine and is thus treated negatively.

Classroom workshop
This idea was developed by Professor ‘Beez’ Schell, and should be used as a way in to talking about and discussing the social model.
Position several chairs and tables normally at the front of the room. Place other tables and chairs randomly, facing in different directions, sometimes blocking access to other chairs and tables.
When students enter the room, they must not move anything from its original position. The teacher should begin a lesson discussing the social model, talking very quietly and writing in very small letters on the board. Any complaints from students should be dealt with by pointing out that the students at the front can hear and see so it is not the teacher’s fault that the others can’t see or hear, or haven’t been able to reach a place to sit.
Once the point has been made, the classroom can be returned to a more accessible state. The ensuing discussion (ask the students ‘disabled’ by the classroom set-up and the teacher’s refusal to alter the environment how they felt about it) should be used to introduce the ideas of the social model and to challenge the individual model of disability.

Disability as metaphor
Jenny Morris (1991) argues that cultural portrayals of disability are usually about the feelings of non-disabled people and their reactions to disability, rather than about disability itself. Disability thus becomes:

...a metaphor...for the message that the non-disabled writer wishes to get across, in the same way that ‘beauty’ is used. In doing this, the writer draws on the prejudice, ignorance and fear that generally exist towards disabled people, knowing that to portray a character with a humped back, with a missing leg, with facial scars, will evoke certain feelings in the reader or audience. The more disability is used as a metaphor for evil, or just to induce a sense of unease, the more the cultural stereotype is confirmed (Morris, 1991:93).

Many impairments are ‘hidden’ (e.g.s dyslexia, visual impairments, deafness).
Ask students to list the types of impairment that they have seen in TV programmes/films/magazine or newspaper articles. How do they feel about the people represented in them? Do they inspire pity or horror for example?

Useful images to consider

Hannibal (film)
Agent Starling goes to see Lecter’s victim who is in bed, hidden in the shadows and surrounded by curtains. The light is raised to give a horror view of his face. The character here is evil too, so we associate his facial scarring with punishment for his evil nature, and also with the visual manifestation of evil (we expect evil people to look evil, thanks to generations of fairy tales). We are supposed to be shocked, to recoil in horror.
How do you think this affects people with facial scarring?

Newspaper photographs
The tabloids are a particularly good source. One recent example was in The Daily Mail, where a Muslim cleric who had his hands blown off in Afghanistan was pictured with his hooks on prominent display, which were described in the article as ‘metal claws’. The article aimed to expose the supposed glut of ‘bogus asylum seekers’ who are also ‘terrorists’ and who are claiming social security benefits funded by taxpayers in Britain. It thus combined iconic images of Muslim fundamentalist masculinity with disability in order to create and to maximise the fear of ‘foreignness’ associated with post 9/11 society.

Television documentaries
Recent examples include Amputee Admirers (Five) which purports to discuss Internet-based groups who run dating/social groups for amputees and those who are attracted to them. In this case, an academic who is also an amputee is questioned in order to give an element of political correctness to a programme which is essentially about voyeurism. However, the camerawork exposes the subtext by zooming in on the academic’s stumps and scars as she speaks. Another example of this is in ITV’s The Unluckiest Faces in Britain which utilises stark lighting and mise-en-scene and big close-ups to emphasise the facial differences of its subjects, while they are interviewed in a supposedly sympathetic manner.

Television drama and film
Wheelchairs tend to predominate here, since they are an iconic sign of disability. Most actors playing disabled characters are, however, not disabled. The wheelchair allows the character to be obviously disabled, whilst still looking ‘normal’, and does not therefore present any major challenges for audience identification. A good example of a film that challenges this view is Coming Home (Hal Ashby, 1978).

Disability and gender: ‘Supercrips’
Supercrips are people who conform to the individual model by overcoming disability, and becoming more ‘normal’, in a heroic way. Jenny Morris argues that in film and TV drama, disability is often used as a narrative device to express ideas of dependency, lack of autonomy, tragedy etc. She argues that

...women do not have to be portrayed as disabled in order to present an image of vulnerability and dependency... therefore most disabled characters in film and television in recent years have been men (Morris in Pointon, 1997:26).

Thus many Supercrip films are about the hell of dependency for men. Since women are viewed as dependent, there is little point in making films about their ‘struggles’ with disability. Perhaps disability does not ‘matter’ so much to a woman?
An example of a ‘Supercrip’ is the Irish writer Christy Brown, who described his book My Left Foot as his “plucky little cripple story”. The film of the same name is full of useful sequences.
Problems with the Supercrip stereotype:
• It focuses on a single individual’s ability to overcome, then puts the onus on other disabled people to do the same.
• What about those who can’t or won’t try to live up to this stereotype?
It is notable that the actors playing these Supercrip roles - which often earn them Oscars - are invariably non-disabled superstars with the requisite face and physique. Thus an impaired male body is visually represented as a perfect physical specimen in a wheelchair.

Difference
It has been argued that dominant notions of ‘normality’ and beauty do not allow for the natural range of difference in human form. These notions are not only prejudicial to the acceptance of disabled people, but also increasingly impact on non-disabled people. Charlotte Cooper, for example, applies the social model to obesity, and concludes that there are some important categories through which obesity can be defined as a disability:
• A slender body is ‘normal’
• Fatness is a deviation from the norm.
• Fat and disabled people share low social status.
• Fatness is medicalised (e.g. jaw-wiring and stomach-stapling).
• Fat people are blamed for their greed and lack of control over their bodies.
Consider why it is that fat people or disabled people are rarely portrayed as sexually attractive.

Discussing telethons
Telethons - especially the BBC’s Children in Need - provide a range of interesting images of disability.
Telethons have been roundly criticised for being “the twentieth-century version of the beggar in the streets. Even the begging-bowls are no longer in our own hands...”
• Is this true?
• Are telethons ever OK?
• What would you replace them with?

Points about Telethons:
• Telethons use images of brave, smiling and grateful recipients of charity. They ask us to donate out of relief that we don’t have their problems.
• They rely on ‘cute’ children, which gives a false impression of the real incidence of disability in the population.
• They create the impression that it is not the job of the state to provide essential funds for disadvantaged groups, and do not question why people are disadvantaged. By making certain people dependent on charity, we create beggars. (Charity is now big business, with marketing executives receiving six figure salaries...)
• Anne Karpf argues that there is a need for charities, but that telethons act to keep the audience in the position of givers, and to keep recipients in their place as grateful and dependent.
• Emotive images push other images out. Those who look fit and well are assumed to be able to look after themselves, which is not always the case.
• Charity is not just about money – it’s also about helping someone with their problems and working alongside them.
• Telethons could help us to understand, but usually don’t. People donate because they’re being entertained. There is a conflict between the way you raise money, and the way you raise awareness. They are not necessarily the same thing.
• Who will give disabled people a job when they see such images? The implicit meaning is that we should help disabled people, not that we should integrate them into society.

What would disabled people like to see?
Karen Ross undertook a qualitative survey of disabled viewers and listeners and concluded:

Many of the changes that viewers and listeners would like to see take place in broadcasting can be described as ‘respect’ issues: respecting the diversity of disability and portraying those varied experiences; respecting the views of disabled people and consulting with them to provide more authentic and credible portraits; respecting the abilities of disabled people and actively involving disabled media professionals in all aspects of programme production across all genres...Crucially, what disabled audiences want is an acknowledgement of the fact that disability is a part of daily life and for the media to reflect that reality, removing the insulting label of ‘disabled’ and making it ordinary (Ross, 1997: 676).

Recommended text
Pointon, Ann with Davies, Chris (eds) (1997) Framed: Interrogating Disability in the Media London: BFI Publishing

References
Morris, Jenny (1991) Pride Against Prejudice: Transforming Attitudes to Disability London: the Women's Press Ltd.

Oliver, Michael (1996) Understanding Disability: From Theory to Practice London: Macmillan Press Ltd.

Ross, Karen (1997) Where's Me In It? Media Culture and Society 1997 Vol 19 pp669-677

© 2003 Lynne Roper and The Media Education Journal