mod07lec27 - The Normal and its End: An interview with Prof. Lennard Davis - Part 1

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[@DeepakKumar-yg7mq]

Thank you

[@FeringiRaj1947]

18:58 Prof Karah brings in the current paradigm of diversity. Prof Davis says this is a difficult subject because while it embraces diversity but it doesn't really mean anything as we are all different so in that in a way we are the same. All of us are unique. However, the embracing of infinite variety becomes exhausting as there is an infinite variety of different states,

[@FeringiRaj1947]

01:30 Proj Lennard J Davis - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lennard_J._Davis a nationally and internationally known American specialist in disability studies, is Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Illinois at Chicago, School of Arts and Sciences, and also Professor of Disability and Human Development in the School of Applied Health Sciences and Professor of Medical Education in the University of Illinois College of Medicine.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

24:50 Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_with_Disabilities_Act_of_1990) The biggest and most extensive civil rights act ever produced in the USA which was produced by political work.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

03:56 He introduces the concept of "normal" in relation to how science helps to describe the human condition. Normal cognitive, normal physical ability, normal form etc.. The word was only recently used in common language (about 150 years).

[@FeringiRaj1947]

15:12 Normalcy develops to introduce variation in nature as a normal state but it still excludes disability.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

17:10 The idea that disability is a malleable and changeable category made Prof Davis consider coining the term "dis-modernism" instead of post-modernism. This leads to idea of inter-dependence being the truer reality. Dis-modernism says the inter-dependance is the real normal situation.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

11:47 This idea of eugenics as the search for the normal leads to the labelling of the "abnormal" which of course included people with disabilities and the need to be the fittest human you can be. This also leads to the forcible sterilisation of women with cognitive or behavioural conditions in the past. Also, it leads to scientific justification of racism.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

01:54 He introduces the concept of bioculture which he says is a branch of bio-politics. Not to be confused with bioculture, a suspension of microbes in a liquid, bio-culture is described as the combination of biological and cultural factors that affect human behaviour. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioculture. Prof. Davis emphasises the importance of knowledge of science to make moral and political decisions.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

25:39 Prof Karah asks about Prof Davis's experience of being in a family with disabilities. Prof Davis explains how his parents were stared at because of they were communicating in sign language.

[@FeringiRaj1947]

06:46 He traced the origin of the word "normal" to a French scientist Adolphe Quetelet (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolphe_Quetelet). Adolphe outlines the project of a social physics and describes his concept of the "average man" (l'homme moyen) who is characterized by the mean values of measured variables that follow a normal distribution. He was an early statistician and collected a lot of data from measuring human bodies to find the "average man". Which leads to the concept of "normal".