At the beginning of the semester, I came across an article titled The Deaf Body in Public Space on my Facebook news feed that was posted by one of my deaf friends. As I read through the article, I found myself nodding in agreement with many of the observations that the author, Rachel Kolb, voiced. Continue reading
Author: prakoch
Video Games, Representation, and Disability: What is Empowerment?
As a person who is considered disabled in mainstream American society, video games have become a way for me to escape feelings of marginalization and feel powerful. More specifically, Western role-playing video games that allow the player to design what their character will look like, as well as the specific attributes they will have, are a very effective escape from the marginalization I often feel as a woman of color who is considered disabled. The player character also becomes very physically and politically powerful over the course of the game and has a significant amount of control over the world around them, contributing to my feelings of empowerment.
A Freak of (Un)Nature: On “Unnatural” and “Natural” Bodies
There is nothing I dread more than the confused, shocked, horrified look on people’s faces after I open my mouth and say something incomprehensible to their untrained ears. I feel like I am exposed for the freak of nature that I am. Despite my years and years of preparation in the form of weekly speech therapy sessions and high-tech cochlear implant, I still clumsily navigate the hearing world, where sound reigns supreme, constantly tripping over tasks that seem mundane to most people.
My body, and more specifically, my ears and voice, are seen as something out of the ordinary and freakish that must be covered up as efficiently as possible or put somewhere else where there are “people like me”.
Hair Removal: Only $25 and a Few Years of Shame!
As someone who spends $25 on threading her eyebrows, among other things, every month, Matthew Immergut’s Manscaping: The Tangle of Nature, Culture, and Male Body Hair struck a chord with me. Body hair removal is connected to capitalism – I could have told you that a long time ago, while shelling out money for shaving cream, razors, and those monthly threading sessions. I could have also told you that hair, and lack thereof, for women is policed by nearly everyone, from boys on the playground making fun of your “unibrow” or “moustache”, aunties telling you that you should wax your legs every six weeks instead of using a harsh razor, by friends telling you that the extra hour spent straightening your hair every morning is “totally worth it! You look SO much better!” Even today, there are countless memes all over social media about how vital it is to get a perfect eyebrow arch and brows that look perfect, but not too perfect. However, reading Immergut’s Manscaping helped me continue the process of fitting together all those fragments into one larger picture that reflects not only my experiences, but the way that Western society treats body hair on brown women as a whole.
Unruly Bodies 