Demystifying the Fantasies of Normalcy: The Discursive Construction of Disability in the Nineteenth Century

「常態」的神話：再探十九世紀「失能」的論述模式

10.30095/SYJH.201101.0007

孫小玉(Hsiao-yu Sun)

傅科 ； 生命權力 ； 優生學 ； 常態 ； 失能研究 ； 能者主義 ； Foucault ； bio-power ； eugenics ； normalcy ； disability studies ； ableism

中山人文學報

30期（2011 / 01 / 01）

155 - 184

英文

近二、三年來，性別、族群、種族等議題迭經後現代理論的質疑與挑戰，與這些議題相關的概念也一再被修正，例如身體的概念。在各種弱勢論述中，儘管失能者是最大的弱勢族群，但在討論與身體相關的議題時，往往卻獨漏失能族群。由此顯見，在現有文化論述中，失能者的身體議題是銷「身」匿跡的。失能研究的稀少或闕如現象似意謂著文化論述體系中，體能健全者之價值觀（ableism）及意識型態方為主流觀點。有鑑於此，本論文將從傅科的論述理論與生命權力的角度，輔以戴維斯、斯蒂克、嘉蘭湯姆森、以及施耐德等人的失能研究，重新檢視十九世紀文化論述中有關失能與正常／常態的歷史淵源、表述／徵形式、與建構模式。本文以跨學科的方法重新省視十九世紀失能的歷史，研究所欲突顯的重點是，正常／常態的意識型態或價值觀是透過統計、優生、遺傳、工業化等概念建構而成，而主流社會中健全者意識型態據此將失能者邊緣化、異化甚或抑化為文化與社會中之「他者」。論文主要分為兩部份，第一部份所欲揭示的是有關「常態」的概念的緣起以及失能者身體或體能上的「差異」如何在社會、文化建構中被賦予不同的意涵。第二部分則探究十九世紀文學作品中如何陳述失能角色，並解析文學作品將失能角色譬喻化、物化、或畸形化的始末與過程。本文重點在於重新認知及體認身體的差異形式與存在模式，視差異為「真實的法則」（the law of real），尊重身體的多元表徵，並試圖破解或顛覆身體「常態」標準化、單一化的既成思維與文化迷思。

During the past few decades, postmodern theories challenge the grand narratives which deride bodies and experiences that do not fit within the standard norm. Their studies on body in critical discourse cover issues related to race, gender, sexuality, and class, while neglecting disability, despite the fact that people with disabilities compose the largest physical minority. Given the preconditions, the essay, drawing on the concepts of discursive formation and bio-power, begins by calling into question what is regarded as normal to scrutinize a range of widely endorsed practices and ideas surrounding normalcy and disability in the nineteenth century, including the historical roots and configurations of the concept of normality and disability, the belief in heredity, the emergence of eugenics, and industrialization in the nineteenth century.The second part of the essay tackles how disabled characters in the nineteenth century literature are constituted to maintain the able-bodied public's ideological projections and investments of normalcy which excludes disability as an other or ”alterity” and how the concept of normalcy has accorded a common set of stigmatizing social values to disability that has determined the treatment and positioning of the disabled people in society. It aims to highlight that physical difference does not carry inherent, deterministic, and essentialized meaning; instead, it must be understood as a social, political, and cultural construction from a culturally created web of meaning as well as a physical phenomenon. Moreover, through the disclosure of the symbolic investments that produce and reproduce disabled subject, the essay also exemplifies the ways that the physical difference is normalized, metaphorized, promulgated, and commodified in the nineteenth-century literary texts. In its broadest application, the essay attempts to challenge the prevailing ableist ideology and transfigure the myth imposed on the disabled body, which is often considered a synonym of deficiency and lack. Finally, the study also reveals how the physical differences from the norm have been insinuated into the social interactions, relational identity, and subjectivity of the disabled characters. By all means, the aim of this essay is not to cover up its difference or deviance from the norm; instead, it begins by recognizing and naming its own incomprehension to avoid essentializing the differences. Through the survey and analysis of the uses of disability in these narratives, the essay also provides a framework for assessing the literary narratives on disability in the nineteenth century.

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