What is Disability Culture? A Response to Petra Kuppers

“Disability culture is not a thing, but a process.” It will also take a more in-depth process for me to fully grasp the concept of this claim. Throughout this introduction to the book Disability Culture and Community Performance, I was waiting for Petra Kuppers to unveil her key point that would diminish my confusion. However, what I now realize is that maybe the fog of navigating her writing is mimicking the troubles trying to define the disability community and disability culture. She makes clear that the “process” of disability culture is undoing the “history of exclusions” that people with disabilities experience when they are limited by the able-bodied world around them. To me this suggests that strictly defining what it means to be disabled is itself a form of these boundaries and limitations. Another exclusive circumstance that Kuppers mentions is the idea of restricting disabled folks because “they could hurt themselves.” This is given as an example with dance, but can be applied to any situation where an able-bodied person might think they are looking out for someone else while they are instead being patronizing. To follow, Kuppers explains that instead of defining disability culture, it needs to be approached through many different forms. Her direct illustration of this is the dynamic nature of her writing. She says that, like accessibility, it can be taken in through many forms. So I can’t say that I can completely answer the question of what disability culture is, but Kuppers made it clear that it is more of an experience than a statement.