Re-thinking Dis/ability
In 2018, after a six-year break from academia, I decided to apply for a PhD. I was the Head of Operations at an incredible children’s hospice charity and loved my work, although funding pressures meant that much needed services were increasingly stretched.
Then I watched Ken Loach’s I, Daniel Blake (2016), the first feature-length fictional film to depict contemporary austerity Britain. I, Daniel Blake reminded me of the resistive potential of fiction to animate social injustices, evoke affective responses, and even call for action. So, in 2019, I returned to the fields of cultural disability studies and the medical humanities to find other cultural depictions of austerity Britain. I analysed post-2010 novels and films responding to austerity – what I call “austerity fictions” – focusing on the representation of disability and class (and their intersection).
Austerity fictions depict the adverse impact of public sector cuts on disability benefits claimants, the social care sector, and the precarious workers exhausted by their demanding schedules (as in I, Daniel Blake and Loach’s 2019 film Sorry We Missed You). Niall Griffiths’ novel Broken Ghost (2019) evocatively explores experiences of poverty and drug addiction through the aesthetics of the undead, revealing the embodied violence of austerity through spectral and zombie metaphors. While Jane Gull’s debut feature film My Feral Heart (2016), tells the story of a young man with Down syndrome who is quietly moved into a remote institution, a consequence of closing independent living funds.
The burgeoning genre of “up lit” has emerged as a different creative response to austerity, promising to temporarily soothe readers who seek imaginative worlds of comfort and hope in the contemporary moment of uncertainty. These novels portray the public health crisis of loneliness, but they also produce recovery narratives where the uplifting resolution is contingent on individual rather than social transformation.
Building on the work of critical disability theorists Robert McRuer, Jasbir Puar, and Daniel Goodley, I argue that these depictions offer generative possibilities for questioning and re-thinking the dis/ability binary, including our experiences of ageing. This has become a core concern of my research as I ask how fiction draws attention to the common ground of structural oppression and imagines new models of labour, interdependence, and care.
Re-thinking Ageing
I am delighted to join The Sciences of Ageing and the Culture of Youth research programme at King’s College London. I am particularly excited to collaboratively work on creative strategies for public engagement, knowledge exchange, and policy development.
The SAACY policy report – Shifting How We View The Ageing Process (September 2023) – highlights the urgent need and opportunity to re-think ageing as a lifelong process rather than something bad that happens at the end of your life. This attitudinal shift is a crucial step in improving clinical practice and social care as well as challenging the cultural pessimism of ageing. The report also identified the need to address wider social and economic factors such as health inequalities and unequal access to opportunities, both in the workplace and local communities.
There are clear links between these recommendations and calls from the disability community, who for decades have challenged negative stereotypes and disabling barriers. In 2002, disability theorist Rosemarie Garland-Thomson even pointed out that ‘we will all become disabled if we live long enough’ (57). With the number of people aged 80+ in the UK expected to double by 2035, this observation has gained further significance as an ageing population will experience increased health related issues and confront the barriers of an inaccessible society.
This changing demographic requires intersectional attention and collaboration between critical disability studies and critical gerontology, an area I am keen to develop in my research. As Ann Leahy’s book Disability and Ageing: Towards a Critical Perspective (2023) demonstrates, intersectional scholarship offers a powerful intervention in the ongoing struggle against ageism and ableism.
As part of SAACY’s programme, we are planning an exhibition at Science Gallery London to share, discuss, and develop research with policy makers and members of the public. ‘Re-thinking Ageing in Science and Society’ aims to showcase SAACY’s work, elevate the voices and lived experiences of older people, and promote intergenerational solidarity. Employing a variety of arts-based methods and designing interactive activities, we also plan to create opportunities for impact, engagement, and learning.