Representation of Disability

What dramas can you think of that have disables people in them?

Game of Thrones

Glee

What do you think of when you think of disability?

Disability makes me think of an individual that does not physically or mentally match up to what is considered to be a norman human being.

Key Statistics of the disabled

 

There are over 6.9 million disabled people of working age which represents 19% of the working population. There are over 10 million disabled people in Britain, of whom 5 million are over state pension age.

Medical model of disability: Shakespeare (1999)

The media throughout history has depicted disability through the use of impairment, Shakespear points out in his article about disability in film.

'impairment is made the most important thing' and disabled characters are 'objectified and distanced from the audience'

The media has focused on portraying impairment through the influence of the medical model of disability.

- disabled peoples inability to interact in normal daily life is a direct result of their physical and/or medical impairment

- Eg. Charles Dickens 'A Christmas Carole'  'Cripples' child of Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim, is defined by his disability and will only survive through medical intervention.

Disabled Bond Characters:

Raoil Silva

Blow-feldt

Dr No

How does this affect the way the disabled are presented?

Annotate within this an analysis of the following clips

Inbetweeners: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uvTgvEzpSzQ

The clip is funny since it has various methods of humour such as 'Juggasaurous rex' and the accusation of stealing from the disabled girl.

The disabled in this clip are represented as having the inability to interact in normal daily life due to their impairment which matches up to Shakespeare's medical model (1999).

Morally, we are not meant to laugh at the disabled person. However the disabled person is not directly laughed at since it involves one of the main characters during the clip.

I think that disabled people would respond to this in a negative manner since it portrays disabled people as nullified objects that are used for humour.

Lifes too short: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jtTjfEW7iQ

The clip in funny since there was a huge misunderstanding with which washing machine to dump and that resulted in him being left in anger.

Warwick is represented as a disabled individual that needs other peoples help to get by in life.

Again, we are morally not meant to be laughing at Warwick because of his disability. However the clip is directed in a way that humour is bombarded to the audience which does bring about laughter to Warwick.

I think Warwick is the butt of the joke since the majority of the focus is on him and all of the humour is generated by him also.

This clip relates to Paul Hunts stereotypes such as the stereotype of being laughable and being unable to participate in daily life.

This also complies with Shakespeare's' stereotype since since it depicts Warwick as his own worse enemy.

Paul Hunt (1991) identified 10 stereotypes that the media use to portray the disabled

- The disabled person is pitiable of pathetic

- An object of curiosity or violence

- Sinister of evil

- The super cripple (1 legged runners)

- As atmosphere

- Laughable

- His/her own worst enemy

- As a burden

- As Non-sexual

- Being unable to participate in daily life