Dancing Identity

Whew. Thanks, first of all, to the Golden Piscis for making that BADD thing happen. Even while I was travelling, I was thinking, reading, reading, reading, and thinking. I've learned so much about the thing that is, in fact so many things, we call disability. The insights into the way people live and think have me transfixed to my screen.

This post is for the disability carnival on disability and identity. It begins with two things: dance and all the posts I read for BADD day. As I read through the many, many BADD posts, I noticed how similar people's experiences of disablism were. Whether or not people identified as disabled in a political way, so many of us shared encounters of ignorance, prejudice, and, in cases, hatred. Whether or not all of us identified, many, many people expressed sentiments about our bodies and impairments that place them wholly in line with the social and cultural models of disability -- even if they wouldn't choose those modes of expression for themselves.

All of this prompts me to look at the possibility of disability identity with a dancer's eye. Even when I am among disabled people, I am sometimes reluctant to voice my commitment to a disability identity. I fear hearing stuff like, "that's too political, too radical, too ugly, too .... That's not me. I don't need it." I often protest, pointing out that those scary radicals are the people who got us our rights and are who still fighting for them today. I understand that as the cultural wars -political climate has turned, identity politics has become a "no." I vigorously protest the need for a political commitment to equality and civil rights. I vociferously protest writing like this -- yes, it's the Guardian again: equally problematic, but less obnoxious -- which characterizes identity as an obstacle to justice and civil rights. I wonder about a third way: culture.

In my dancing work, I don't spend an awful lot of time thinking about or articulating a disability identity. Much of my daily life is spent creating a space in which my body and I can agree on what is possible for a given day. But as I go about my work and my preparations for work, I am gradually becoming aware of the importance of disability culture -- in itself and as a marker of disability identity.

My dancing day starts with an adapted qi gong sequence. I turn up the music (or put in my earphones) and begin with a breathing sequence. I rub my hands together and breathe for 2 8 bar/measure phrases and sometimes more. During this time, I try and clear my mind and focus on my body. I look for the areas that are tight, painful, not active/activated. I try and identify how I feel about this, myself, and my body and let those feelings come to the surface; I clear them. Then, I begin warming up the individual parts of my body. All in all, the qi gong takes about 14 minutes; my barre sequence takes a further 25. Then, I'm done and ready to move (or go about my regular day, depending -- the sequence is good for the body no matter what). This is a physically and emotionally necessary foundation to a successful dance day, but I was getting to think it might be a useful foundation for a disability cultural identity.

I like the idea of a cultural identity that is part practice -- the practice of the ways we live and the ideas about our bodies, impairment) and part culture -- meaning the art, the arts, literature, etc. About the practice thing. I suppose that I am here borrowing (simplistically) from Bourdieu's notions of the habitus. About which you can read the short and sweet version from here: "Concept from Bourdieu (with roots going back to Mauss and beyond), denoting the totality of learned, bodily skills, habits, style, taste etc. Habitus may be understood as a variant of culture that is anchored in the body." A more elliptically distilled complex version is available here; it is particularly helpful because it explains how personal practices affect how we evaluate and assess each other, affect society at large, including public policy, and determine or block the process of social change.

What I like about the two aspects of the definition is that they both begin with the body. And, if you read through the BADD posts, you definitely have insight into the practices and attitudes disabled people have about their impairments. Amidst the diversity of impairments, I can sense a culture not one of sameness, but one of mutually supporting and supportive perspectives that are informed by, but don't necessarily follow, the social model of disability. There is a culture here. This culture of attitudes and practices identifies us as disabled.

On top of this body culture, there is the culture of my dancing world -- and that of all of the disabled performers, writers, and artists. We are part of a disability culture that links our bodies to the arts. And we are artists in the strongest, truest, and most provocative senses of the word. Our work is cultural and identifying. You can spot it when you see it, even if the artists don't name themselves as Disabled. You can see it in the view of the body, in the lines, in the movement, and in the very image.

We are not a single impairment. Indeed, the diversity of our impairments has often been held up as the single strongest argument against the possibility of a disabled identity. But that is making an argument on biological, medicalized terms; that is playing on their terms. Looking into culture and into the ways we understand our impairments, our bodies, and our minds, you can see, yes, there is disabled identity. You can see it in our culture.