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Signifying bodies : disability in contemporary life writing / G. Thomas Couser.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Couser, G. Thomas.
- Series:
- Corporealities
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- People with disabilities--United States--Biography--History and criticism.
- People with disabilities.
- People with disabilities, Writings of, American.
- People with disabilities in literature.
- Autobiography.
- United States.
- Genre:
- Electronic books.
- Biographies.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (viii, 204 pages) : illustrations.
- Place of Publication:
- Ann Arbor : University of Michigan Press, c2009.
- System Details:
- text file
- Summary:
- Memoirs have enjoyed great popularity in recent years, experiencing significant sales, prominent reviews, and diverse readerships. Signifying Bodies shows that at the heart of the memoir phenomenon is our fascination with writing that focuses on what it means to live in, or be, an anomalous body-in other words, what it means to be disabled. Previous literary accounts of the disabled body have often portrayed it as a stable entity possibly signifying moral deviance or divine disfavor, but contemporary writers with disabilities are defining themselves and depicting their bodies in new ways. Using the insights of disability studies and source material ranging from the Old and New Testaments to the works of authors like Lucy Grealy and Simi Linton and including contemporary films such as Million Dollar Baby, G. Thomas Couser sheds light on a broader cultural phenomenon, exploring topics such as the ethical issues involved in disability memoirs, the rhetorical patterns they frequently employ, and the complex relationship between disability narrative and disability law.
- Contents:
- Introduction: the some body memoir
- Paradigms cost: disability and cultural representation
- Rhetoric and self-representation in disability memoir
- Double exposure: performing conjoined twinship
- Identity, identicality, and life writing: telling (the silent) twins apart
- Autoethnography and developmental disability: riding the bus with my sister
- Disability as metaphor: what's wrong with Lying
- Lucy Grealy and the some body obituary
- Life writing and disability law: undoing hardship
- Epilogue: the new disability memoir.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references and index.
- Description based on information from the publisher.
- ISBN:
- 9780472070695
- 047207069X
- 9780472050697
- 0472050699
- Publisher Number:
- 10.3998/mpub.915367
- Access Restriction:
- Restricted for use by site license.
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