Datum
2023-12-11Autor
Wechuli, YvonneSchlagwort
300 Sozialwissenschaften, Soziologie Inklusion <Soziologie>MedikalisierungBehinderter MenschDiskriminierungMetadata
Zur Langanzeige
Aufsatz
Medicalizing disabled people’s emotions - Symptom of a dis/ableist society
Zusammenfassung
The theoretical - conceptual article at hand explores how emotional discourses shape social relations by specifically focusing on the medicalization of disabled - and chronically ill - people's emotions. Medicalization is a concept from medical sociology that describes medicine's expansion into non-medical life areas, for instance into the realm of emotions, sometimes in order to challenge this expansion. The emotions of disabled people are often presented as a medicalized problem, rather than recognizing their embeddedness in a dis/ableist socio-cultural context. Such discourses instrumentalize feelings in order to individualize the responsibility for disability. For a contextualized and emancipatory approach, this study reviews papers on medicalized emotions from Disability Studies - a research program that can provide a rich archive of experiential accounts yet to be theorized through a comprehensive emotional perspective. The medicalization of disabled people's emotions can manifest in different ways: (1) In a dis/ableist society, able-mindedness is compulsory; i.e., we fail to question that a healthy mind is the norm and something to strive for unconditionally. This is also true on an emotional level; after all, some medical diagnoses are based on the wrong degree or temporality of emotionality. (2) Unpleasant feelings such as sadness are misunderstood as symptoms of impairment rather than effects of discrimination. (3) The expression of hurt feelings, e.g., related to discrimination, can easily be dismissed as hysterical. This assumption epistemologically disables patients. (4) Love and desire are delegitimized as fetish, for example, the desire for a disabled lover or the wish to start a family despite a chronic illness. The medicalization of disabled people's emotions individualizes and delegitimizes unpleasant emotions that emerge in a dis/ableist society. Different facets of medicalization enforce medical treatment instead, albeit in different ways. Disabled and sick people are cast as not feeling and desiring the right way, while hegemonic discourse prescribes psychological treatment against the effects of discrimination and bodily symptoms it cannot explain. Beyond the dismissal of disabled people's experience, adverse effects on healthcare delivery and health outcomes can be expected.
Zitierform
In: Frontiers in Sociology Volume 8 (2023-12-11) eissn:2297-7775Förderhinweis
Gefördert durch den Publikationsfonds der Universität KasselZitieren
@article{doi:10.17170/kobra-202402029512,
author={Wechuli, Yvonne},
title={Medicalizing disabled people’s emotions - Symptom of a dis/ableist society},
journal={Frontiers in Sociology},
year={2023}
}
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2024-02-02T14:15:19Z 2024-02-02T14:15:19Z 2023-12-11 doi:10.17170/kobra-202402029512 http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/15430 Gefördert durch den Publikationsfonds der Universität Kassel eng Namensnennung 4.0 International http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ disability dis/ableism emotion medicalization compulsory able-mindedness impairment effects hysteria fetishization 300 Medicalizing disabled people’s emotions - Symptom of a dis/ableist society Aufsatz The theoretical - conceptual article at hand explores how emotional discourses shape social relations by specifically focusing on the medicalization of disabled - and chronically ill - people's emotions. Medicalization is a concept from medical sociology that describes medicine's expansion into non-medical life areas, for instance into the realm of emotions, sometimes in order to challenge this expansion. The emotions of disabled people are often presented as a medicalized problem, rather than recognizing their embeddedness in a dis/ableist socio-cultural context. Such discourses instrumentalize feelings in order to individualize the responsibility for disability. For a contextualized and emancipatory approach, this study reviews papers on medicalized emotions from Disability Studies - a research program that can provide a rich archive of experiential accounts yet to be theorized through a comprehensive emotional perspective. The medicalization of disabled people's emotions can manifest in different ways: (1) In a dis/ableist society, able-mindedness is compulsory; i.e., we fail to question that a healthy mind is the norm and something to strive for unconditionally. This is also true on an emotional level; after all, some medical diagnoses are based on the wrong degree or temporality of emotionality. (2) Unpleasant feelings such as sadness are misunderstood as symptoms of impairment rather than effects of discrimination. (3) The expression of hurt feelings, e.g., related to discrimination, can easily be dismissed as hysterical. This assumption epistemologically disables patients. (4) Love and desire are delegitimized as fetish, for example, the desire for a disabled lover or the wish to start a family despite a chronic illness. The medicalization of disabled people's emotions individualizes and delegitimizes unpleasant emotions that emerge in a dis/ableist society. Different facets of medicalization enforce medical treatment instead, albeit in different ways. Disabled and sick people are cast as not feeling and desiring the right way, while hegemonic discourse prescribes psychological treatment against the effects of discrimination and bodily symptoms it cannot explain. Beyond the dismissal of disabled people's experience, adverse effects on healthcare delivery and health outcomes can be expected. open access Wechuli, Yvonne 12 Seiten doi:10.3389/fsoc.2023.1230361 Inklusion <Soziologie> Medikalisierung Behinderter Mensch Diskriminierung publishedVersion eissn:2297-7775 Frontiers in Sociology Volume 8 false 1230361
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