[Ohio-talk] FW: Blind Person vs. Person Who is Blind
Kaiti Shelton
kaiti.shelton at gmail.com
Fri Feb 3 20:24:20 UTC 2017
I think one of my last responses could you some clarification. I totally understand and agree with Marianne's last point about people adjusting to blindness. It makes complete an obvious sense why they would not be so quick to think about or express blindness as a positive trait. We all know that for these people, and adjustment period is something they need to work through in their own way, at their own pace. What I was specifically talking about was professionals without disabilities promoting these hierarchies and ignoring what people with disabilities have said for themselves. I've never been able to get a good explanation as to why it is so hard or unthinkable to ask a client about their preferences from staunch supporters of person first language. To me, it takes all of five seconds and shows that you care about the clients point of view, but it also can provide insight as to where the client might be in there personal adjustment to their disability or start a conversation that could aid in building rapport.
In my music therapy classes we are taught to pay close attention to power structures, as in many cases the clients we see don't have as much access to situations or resources that help to empower them. While power structures can't be avoided completely, and they matter somewhat less in some situations than others such as when the therapist is clearly an adult figure working with children, you can be aware and attentive to how they function and either promote or strip away empowerment for the client. Especially when working with adults, recognizing autonomy and what the person finds important to their identity, even if you don't agree with them, is huge. In a lot of cases people receiving other therapies are used to having professionals tell them what to do without focusing on the person they are helping so much. Sometimes having a space and a relationship with someone who treats them as an equal person rather than a diagnosis to be treated can make all the difference in the world. Personally, I find it appalling that so few college programs actually require students to take disability studies courses before they actually get into the field and work with people who have disabilities. My own school doesn't require it or even have such a class, but to the credit of my professors I was pleased as punch when one of them brought up identity first language and explained what it was in a class last year, so at least my classmates know it exists.
This thread came at a very timely point in the semester, as I am possibly going to start research for a presentation of undergraduate studies held in April. I want to look at how disable professionals in music therapy might perceive their work or the profession differently from their colleagues without disabilities. I know being blind has certainly impacted my worldview and philosophy in ways that are different from my classmates, and I'm curious to see if professionals with other disabilities feel the same way. There have been threads on this issue before, and I know that I've talked with Marianne at least once about how professionals with disabilities are sometimes treated interestingly in professional settings like conferences, but as more and more disabled students go to college and enter helping professions that they themselves might have personally benefited from as clients, that intersection of someone from a served demographic actually being an equal in dishing out the services will have to be reckoned with. The lack of literature examining the intersection between music therapy and disability studies topics is sad to me, but I'm hoping, perhaps out of optimism in naïveté, that the youth of the profession compared to other fields, the interdisciplinary nature that draws from more established professions that have already examined these issues more in depth, and the small number of professionals with disabilities in practice at any given time are the main reasons why rather than ignorance or denial that these issues exist.
Kaiti Shelton
> On Feb 3, 2017, at 2:32 PM, marianne via Ohio-Talk <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>
> Kaiti, I definitely agree with what you said here. Blind is just a
> describing word. We put either a positive or negative interpretation on the
> word. Many people who have always been blind or have been blind a long time
> are very comfortable but people who have recently lost their vision struggle
> with the comfort. If someone who has always been rich looses all of their
> money for whatever reason they would struggle with living like the rest of
> us. They wouold not be comfortable for many years. I know that is a crazy
> comparison. strug
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ohio-Talk [mailto:ohio-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Kaiti
> Shelton via Ohio-Talk
> Sent: Friday, February 3, 2017 1:35 PM
> To: NFB of Ohio Announcement and Discussion List <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org>
> Cc: Kaiti Shelton <kaiti.shelton at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Ohio-talk] FW: Blind Person vs. Person Who is Blind
>
> I also like what Marianne had to say, but part of it for me is challenging
> old perceptions of disability that are outdated and uninformed. At least for
> me, I think that people who are resistant to using identity first language,
> particularly in fields that have taught them that person first is the gold
> standard, are fearful and don't necessarily know what they don't know. That
> in itself isn't their fault, because old ideas diehard, but I wonder what
> fear might motivate them to continue doing so in the face of disabled people
> themselves actually speaking up and saying that they don't mind or like
> their disability as a part of their identity. Most helping professions have
> a continuing education requirements, so one might think that more people
> would be receptive to using identity first language for people that want it
> that way, but there are some people who simply refuse to do it at all. And
> if professions serving disable people are that far removed from current
> issues in disability studies, it creates a hierarchy, where the person
> dishing out the service by virtue of them not having a disability like their
> client knows better than the client knows himself. There is a saying in the
> autism community that says nothing about us without us, and I think that's
> an important reminder for people in helping professions to defer to the
> source and admit that sometimes they don't always know what's best for their
> clients as well as they think they do.
>
> Kaiti Shelton
>
>> On Feb 3, 2017, at 9:44 AM, Robert Spangler via Ohio-Talk
> <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>
>> Thanks to those of you who responded to this! Kaiti, I never thought
>> of it that way -- that's a good point. If I'm a tall/short person,
>> skinny person, etc, then what's wrong with me being a blind person?
>> Now that I think about that, I'm even more offended by the person who
>> is blind crap. On the other hand, Maryann said that the words that
>> one uses are not important and that it's more about how she is
>> treated. At the end of the day, the words don't really make a
>> difference (except for maybe emotionally), so that's definitely a great
> point! Have a good day!
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Ohio-Talk [mailto:ohio-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
>> Smith, JW via Ohio-Talk
>> Sent: Wednesday, February 1, 2017 1:09 PM
>> To: NFB of Ohio Announcement and Discussion List
>> <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org>
>> Cc: Smith, JW <smithj at ohio.edu>
>> Subject: Re: [Ohio-talk] FW: Blind Person vs. Person Who is Blind
>>
>>
>> Dear Kaiti and Robby:
>>
>> Thank you for your excellent and provocative messages on this topic.
>>
>> You both have eloquently and effectively captured the essence and
>> substance of it all in my opinion!
>>
>> Well done!
>>
>> Keep thinking and writing please?
>>
>> Jw
>>
>> Dr. jw Smith
>> School of Communication Studies
>> Scripps College of Communication
>> Schoonover Center, Rm. 427
>> Athens, OH 45701
>> smithj at ohio.edu
>> T: 740-593-4838
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Ohio-Talk [mailto:ohio-talk-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
>> Kaiti Shelton via Ohio-Talk
>> Sent: Wednesday, February 01, 2017 1:43 AM
>> To: NFB of Ohio Announcement and Discussion List
>> <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org>
>> Cc: Kaiti Shelton <kaiti.shelton at gmail.com>
>> Subject: Re: [Ohio-talk] FW: Blind Person vs. Person Who is Blind
>>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> This is something that drives me crazy on nearly a daily basis. Like
>> everyone else in one of the helping professions, I have to use person
>> first language in any professional document I write. Personally, I
>> don't agree with it for some of the reasons Robby described. Person
>> first language did not come about from disable people themselves, but
>> from professionals serving them who thought it would be more offensive
>> to focus on disabilities, because their perception was that
>> disabilities were bad. With the disability Pride movement that has
>> really taken off the past several years, concepts like ableism and
>> identity first language have increasingly been talked about by people
>> with all kinds of disabilities in everything from professional
>> articles and books to writings on the mighty. I personally align with
>> people in the identity first camp, simply because I reject the
>> sentiment that a couple decades ago people helping disabled people
>> made this decision without actually consulting disable people as a
>> whole, and I think it has made things more taboo. Plus, it just feels
>> clunky in my mouth and in my ears. Every other adjective to describe a
>> person goes before the word, and it doesn't necessarily mean a bad
>> thing. I am a short person, and a passionate person, and a young
>> person... so person who is blind seems out of place. I don't know if
>> it has so much to do with disability pride as it does just being
>> honest and really and acknowledging disabilities as another different,
>> but not detrimental, trait people have in life. Of course, that will
>> be different for every person, but if you subscribe to the notion that
>> disability is just another aspect of humanity, identity first language
>> makes sense. For me, and for other people in similar fields, this
>> creates a bit of a problem because you have to be careful in how you
>> speak about yourself A bit, because depending on where you work
>> colleagues who are less familiar with these things could consider you
>> to be unethical or not treating people with do dignity and respect.
>> The best solution I have come up with for this is to describe myself
>> however I want, since that shouldn't really offend other people and if
>> it does it's their problem, and then to ask other people how they
>> would like to be referred to. It's really annoying, but in terms of
>> following ethics and outdated standards that assume everyone wants to
>> be labeled by person first terms, it's a way to cover The bases. It's
>> kind of amazing to me that the Deaf and Autism communities in addition
>> to the NFB have spoken up and said it's OK or preferable to say Deaf
> person/Autistic person/blind person and have been completely ignored in a
> lot of ways, but it's just the reality that helping professions have some
> way to go and their understanding of disability studies to break down their
> perceived
>> hierarchies.
>>
>> Kaiti Shelton
>>
>>> On Jan 31, 2017, at 9:42 PM, Robert Spangler via Ohio-Talk
>> <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hello everyone:
>>>
>>> This topic has undoubtedly come up before, but either I wasn't around
>>> for it or I don't remember. So I am curious to know people's
>>> thoughts on being referred to as a blind person vs. a person who is
> blind.
>>> It's something with which I struggle. Those of you who know me well
>>> are aware that I have no use for political correctness, which is
>>> usually why I refer to myself as a blind person. On the other hand,
>>> however, I can see the point of why one might prefer to be called a
>>> person
>> who is blind.
>>>
>>> To my understanding, saying "a person who is blind" means a person
>>> who happens to be blind--referring to the blindness as another
>>> characteristic, such as being skinny, fat, tall, short, blonde, you
>>> get the picture. I like this form of speech for this reason, because
>>> I believe that all of us work hard to get people to stop paying
>>> attention to our blindness over everything else. All of us are tired
>>> of our blindness coming up as the main point of conversation with so
>>> many sighted folks. Sure, there are those people who pay it no mind,
>>> but I would say most of the people we come across on the streets make
>>> one comment about it at least. So explaining this form of speech to
>>> them helps to explain that blindness is just another characteristic.
>>> When we must prove ourselves all the time and face lower
>>> expectations, we
>> only want it to be seen as another characteristic.
>>>
>>> Now there's "blind person," which in many ways describes me, I think.
>>> Maybe I'm being hypocritical, I'm not quite sure, but I do think that
>>> blindness changes how we do many things. It doesn't make things
>>> impossible, but my life would be significantly different were I not
>>> blind. My hobbies would probably be different, my skills, my
>>> upbringing, etc. I don't necessarily see this as a bad thing, so
>>> long as I am happy with myself, which I am. So in a way, I see
>>> blindness as being a defining characteristic of myself, much like how
>>> someone who is
>> black may see that characteristic as defining them.
>>> I have never let blindness stop me from doing anything and, whenever
>>> someone tries to tell me that I can't do something because I am
>>> blind, I do it anyway and usually succeed. So maybe I have a little
>>> bit of
>> "blind pride."
>>> Inside, I see myself as a blind person because I have fully grasped
>>> blindness and do not see it as something that holds me back. I had a
>>> friend tell me yesterday, "you identify as blind, whereas I just
>>> consider it another characteristic of myself." Yes, it is a
>>> characteristic but I can't help but also thinking that it does make
>>> our lives different, as much as many people may deny it. I think the
>>> only reason people would deny it, though, is the negativity that
>>> surrounds
>> blindness.
>>>
>>> I think the main problem we have identifying with blindness is that
>>> so many people see it as negative and tragic. While I'm comfortable
>>> with being blind and lead a normal life, I still explain to sighted
>>> people who I am trying to educate that blindness is just another
>>> characteristic and reserve the identifying as blind (blind person)
>>> thoughts with those to whom I am very close.
>>>
>>> Thoughts? I know I rambled a bit but this is something I've been
>>> thinking about lately.
>>>
>>> Robby
>>>
>>> --
>>> Robert Spangler
>>> Secretary, Miami Valley Chapter of the National Federation of the
>>> Blind of Ohio Spangler.robert at gmail.com
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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