Reimagining Disability as Knowledge

This paper analyzes the representation of disability as knowledge in two speculative fiction narratives, Annalee Newitz’s Autonomous (2017) and Robert Venditti’s The Surrogates (2006). Drawing upon disability studies theories, specifically Crip Theory, Cripistemology, and Crip Technoscience, this paper explains that in each work, disability is not understood as a deficit or lack; instead, disability is portrayed as a difference, an affirmative source of power, agency, and knowledge production (Johnson & McRuer, 2014). In Autonomous, the disabled heroine, Jack, uses biohacking to gain freedom, turning her body into a weapon and undermining her personhood. Meanwhile, The Surrogates serves as a scathing commentary on the technology industry and the beauty standards it promotes, as well as the plight of physically challenged persons in the computer-mediated avatar environment that favors the physically fit. By closely examining these texts, the paper demonstrates how they enable new modes of representing disability, which are made possible by digital and cybernetic bodies, and urges a future in which disability will be accepted as a form of human diversity and knowledge (Newitz, 2017). This paper contributes to the ongoing conversations in disability studies about how speculative fiction can challenge and expand our understandings of disability, alternative ways of knowing technology, embodiment, and justice (Siebers, 2008)

Avatar · Disability studies · Empowerment · Digital Games and Media · Disability Rights and Representation · Utopian, Dystopian, and Speculative Fiction