Building Bridges with Accessible Care: Disability Studies, Feminist Care Scholarship, and Beyond

Abstract

This article uses elements of autoethnography to theorize an in/formal support relationship between a friend with a physical disability, who uses attendant services, and me. Through thinking about our particular “frien‐tendant” relationship, I find the common scholarly orientations toward “care” are inadequate. Starting from the conversations between feminist and disability perspectives on care, I build on previous work to further develop the theoretical framework of accessible care. Accessible care takes a critical, engaged approach that moves beyond understanding “accessibility” as merely concrete solutions to create more inclusive forms of care. Care, in this context, is positioned as an unstable tension among competing definitions, including that it is a complex form of oppression. Accessible care draws on feminist disability perspectives and the feminist political ethic of care to build bridges in four areas: from daily experiences of disability and support to theoretical discussions; across feminist care research and disability perspectives; across divisions and anxieties within disability communities; and from the local to transnational applications. These bridges do not aim to resolve debates but allow us to travel back and forth between differing perspectives and demonstrate the tenuous possibility of accessible practices and concepts of care.

Organizing survival and resistance in austere times: shifting disability activism and care politics in Ontario, Canada

“…The politics of care Care, for many disability scholars and activists, is a highly contested concept (Kelly 2013a(Kelly , 2014Morris 2004;Silvers 1997;Thomas 2007). The history and ongoing legacies of care are structured by exploitive and oppressive relations, from subtle coercions played out on the microscale between disabled people and those who support them, to mass institutionalization of disabled bodies undertaken in the name of 'caring for' people with disabilities.…”

Care parading as service: Negotiating recognition and equality in user‐controlled personal assistance

“…Since the 1960s, disabled people within the Independent Living movement have struggled to be treated as equals to non‐disabled people in Western European countries, Japan and the United States (Williams‐Searle, ), and their history is in many ways similar to that of women and the feminist movement in their struggle for equality and recognition (Davis, ; Garland‐Thomson, ; Morris, ). The movements diverge, however, in at least one important and work‐related area, namely, the conceptualization and understanding of care and care work (Kelly, ; Morris, ; Williams, ). To many disabled people, care connotes oppression, whereas for feminists, care connotes invisible, underrated and low‐paid work.…”

“…While arguing for an understanding of care practices as collaborative practices, we do not imply that this particular grounding of care will serve as a guaranty against harm and the misuse of power. Professional care practices will always involve a risk of harm due to structural power relations that may contradict professionals’ (good) intentions and how their actions and practices are understood and received by the user (Doel et al, ; Kelly, ; Kelly & Chapman, ). Nevertheless, we contend that framing good care practices as collaborative actions may serve as a productive point of departure for rethinking current articulations of the work relationship between supervisors and their PAs as service.…”

Timing Problems: When Care and Violence Converge in Stephen King's Horror Novel Christine

“… For other ambivalent approaches in care theory, see Cloyes ; Sander‐Staudt ; Petterson ; Kelly ; Murphy ; Simplican . …”