Extraordinary Disabilities - Philip Kerr writes about the representation of disability in ELT
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“Better representation of people with disabilities would be a relatively small step in the direction of a more inclusive approach to education” writes teacher trainer and award-winning writer of materials for English language learners and teachers, Philip Kerr. In his article he considers different approaches to the representation of disability in materials and classroom practice.
I learnt recently that the most requested video in the Ready to Run catalogue is Ade’s ‘Our Clothes’. It’s also one of the films that captured my attention the most. In case you haven’t seen it, it follows a British TV presenter, Ade Adepitan, as he explores what happens to old European clothes that are exported to Ghana for recycling, and the effect this has on local African fashions. At times, visually stunning, it’s a fascinating snapshot of people’s attitudes, jobs and lives in a part of the world very different from mine.
Because I don’t live in the UK, I’d never heard of Ade Adepitan, who appears frequently on TV, both as an actor and as a presenter, and featured in a four-part series where he roams or paraglides across rainforests, deserts and mountains. He has an honorary doctorate, awarded for his charity work, and, as a member of the British basketball team, he won a gold medal at the Paralympic Games.
When I first watched the video, I didn’t notice that he was a wheelchair-user. But on second viewing, I couldn’t help asking myself how he managed to get to these places. Flying from London to Ghana when you’re in a wheelchair can’t be much fun. I hope, at least, they flew him first-class. Travel is often hard enough when you just have a stick or a walking aid, and I wouldn’t even attempt a journey like that. Ade Adepitan is clearly someone out of the ordinary.
Mobility disability, on the other hand, is not out of the ordinary at all. In Britain, and the figures for the rest of Europe are similar, about one in five people has a disability of some kind. The most common kind of disability is mobility disability … which means that about 7 million Brits have mobility issues. Over a million of them are wheelchair users, or still waiting to get a wheelchair.
That’s a lot of people, but you don’t see many people with disabilities in educational materials. ELT publishers are usually very careful these days to ensure a mix of racial backgrounds. But representations of people with disabilities are very rare. When you do see them, they tend to be in prominent focus as the subject of a text, and they are invariably descriptions of fairly extraordinary people: Paralympic champions, deaf rappers, blind singers, Frida Kahlo, or Stephen Hawking.
ELT coursebooks are, of course, full of uplifting or entertaining stories about people who are special in some way. However, they are also full of representations of people who are totally ordinary: the invented characters who take part in functional-language conversations, the illustrations that accompany new vocabulary (parts of the body, family members and so on), the teacher explaining grammar in the video. In these representations, I never see anyone with a disability. True, most disabilities are not as visible as a wheelchair. True, too, that most people with disabilities are older than the smiling youth and young adults filling most pages. But, even so.
Better representation of people with disabilities would be a relatively small step in the direction of a more inclusive approach to education. Hopefully, it would help us towards a normalising of disability, perhaps a greater understanding of what it means to have mobility problems. It shouldn’t be too hard to achieve, but it raises a couple of questions that I struggle to answer.
During the production of ELT materials, it is common these days to do a rough head count of the visual representations of diversity. Some categories of diversity, of course, don’t usually get counted at all, especially if the publisher is targeting sales in a part of the world where diversity is the last thing that’s wanted. But mobility disability is a much less culturally divisive topic than some forms of diversity, and is unlikely to affect sales. So, if it were included in the categories of diversity that are counted in a set of learning materials, how many representations of disability would be needed to avoid it being a tokenistic gesture? And, since most mobility disability (like so many differences) is not immediately visible in a photo, can we really ensure that it is noticed without highlighting it, without making the visible signs of disability (the walking aid or the prosthetic, for example) inappropriately prominent? And this leads me to my second unanswered question.
Besides the basic numerical matter, there’s also the matter of the kind of representation. Should disability be a key part of the topic of a text or activity, or should it be approached more obliquely (as in Ade’s ‘Our Clothes’)? The advantage of the former is that learners will discuss or reflect on disability as openly as possible (according to context). The drawback is that not everyone wants to talk about disability, particularly not their own or that of someone close to them, and not in school. There’s a danger, too, that some learners will be resistant to what they see as preaching.
I’ve been trying to find answers to these questions for a few months now, reading guidance articles and attending webinars run by experts in this field. But, still without answers to my questions, I’m beginning to feel that there are no clear answers to them. I’ve heard all sorts of suggestions. One, that I came across recently, is that we should shows environments that are disability-friendly – ramps, for example. But in most parts of the world, ramps are not the norm (a university where I work has no ramps and no lifts), so I’m not sure what is to be gained from this selective representation of the real world. Another idea I heard was that, in pictures of groups of people, the person with a mobility disability should not be stuck at the end of the line, as a kind of appendage. But, when I am asked to take part in group photos, I will always want to position myself at the end of the line, simply because I am less likely to be jostled there – I feel safer.
I read in the news today about a wheelchair-user, Chi Wai Lai, who attempted to climb a 320-metre tower in Hong Kong, by hoisting himself up via a series of pulleys. He wanted to raise money for people with spinal cord issues, and, at the same time, to show that disabled people are not always weak, do not always need help or pity. It’s a good story, even though (or perhaps because) he didn’t quite make it to the top, but is this the kind of story that will help to change attitudes? It’s true, uplifting and aspirational, but does it perpetuate what has been called the ‘supercrip’ stereotype (some extraordinary ability that compensates for their disability)? I really don’t know the answer.
Perhaps both the oblique and the direct approaches are needed, but with more of the former. With ‘Our Clothes’, I would not want, in class, to highlight in any way the fact that Ade is in a wheelchair. If someone raised the issue, fine - I'd see where they want to take it, but I think here that a focus on disability risks detracting from the intrinsic interest of the story about clothes.
The story of Chi Wai Lai is another matter, since the issue of disability is central. Chi Wai Lai is a motivational speaker who talks about daring to dream and the importance of resilience, and it is this angle I would explore. One way to do so would be to get students to do a ‘grit quiz’ (quite a few are available online), leading to a discussion about their own resilience and moments in their lives when it is needed. A video report of his attempted climb (such as this short, subtitled one from the South China Morning Post) makes a good follow-on. This, in turn, leads to a speaking activity where the class is divided into small groups, each working on a different question: (1) In what situations (work, education, etc.) will people benefit from listening to a good motivational speaker? (2) What qualities does a motivational speaker need? Students then pair off with a partner from another group and share what they have discussed.
Philip Kerr February 2021
To accompany the article DLA has made a selection of Ready to Run authentic videos from our catalogue (Pass: Ready2Run). There are stories from all around the world of people who manage life challenges. At DLA diversity is not an option but a core commitment we are working towards fulfilling.