Who’s disabled, Babe?: Carving out a good life among the normal and everyday

Abstract

© 2018 selection and editorial matter, Gareth M. Thomas and Dikaios Sakellariou; individual chapters, the contributors. This chapter draws upon the life narrative of Helen, an elderly disability feminist activist, to traverse normative notions of the good life that have been central to Western political liberalism and its ableist ideal of human flourishing. Helen’s life narrative reveals the differing modalities of reflexive experimentation that become a vital strategy to reimage and practice notions of the good life. Helen’s embodied practices of everyday life are illustrative of the diffuse ways in which disability enables the reimaging of inclusive forms of liberal citizenship.