On this page the following entries were made in the “contemporary culture” category.
Archive for “contemporary culture”
Wheelchairs, Jocks, Geeks & Glee
Under the influence of our 14 year old, dance-crazed neighbor I’ve watched Glee from the beginning. (Under her influence I’ve also watched every episode of So You Think You Can Dance for the past three years.)
On first watch of Glee I was impressed with how exaggerated and over the top the show was. It also had irony and a bite—a send-up rather than a satire. The characters are hyper-stereotypes. representing some of the more visible high school cliques, in particular, jocks, cheerleaders, and the glee club members (who are at the bottom of the high school pecking order.) The plot is almost always unbelievable yet based on our painful perceptions of high school, which is part of the fun.
For awhile I was confused about the role of the wheelchair-using glee club member, Artie.
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Google & Zazzle-time wasters
Buff Bagwell was a US wrestler who used a wheelchair for prop. This was years ago. I found an action figure of him. Pushing a button on the back of the wheelchair caused the wrestler figure to leap out of his wheelchair—strange, but kind of cool.
Today, not being able to remember his name, I googled wheelchair wrestler. Wow! I became lost for hours. The most fun and the biggest time sink was on Zazzle. Zazzle is a site where one can “create your own one-of-a-kind product.” I found a T-shirt with wheelchair Sumo wrestlers! Once I started searching for “wheelchair,” “gimp,” “disabled,” etc I was lost for the next half hour.
My favorite T-shirt design is this:
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VSA Postcard Project
I managed to make the deadline for the VSA Arts Postcard Project. The theme was to create a postcard with the artist’s definition of disability.
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New York Times Paying Attention
Little by little, the good, gray Times has started to recognize disability. Sometimes, it’s even bold in recognizing our perception of the lived experience of disability, rather than the stereotypes. The boldest that I noticed was, of course, the articles written by the late Harriet McBryde Johnson.
Last week I noticed on my Times RSS [...]
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Statues…That Reminds Me
From what I can tell from this side of the pond, there was a huge hue and cry when it was announced in 2005 that a sculpture of a naked, pregnant, disabled woman would be on display in Trafalgar Square for 18 months.
I can’t imagine a statue like this in a public space in the [...]
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Wheelchairs as symbols
A friend and colleague has his antenna out for disability-related songs since we talked about our music explorations. (He’s fascinated by the use of anthems — both contemporary and historical — and how they connect.) He pointed me to an Alt-Country song, “We Can’t Make It Here Any More” by James McMurtry and a video [...]
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Disability Film Series-NYC
El Cochecito (The Little Coach) is a new dark comedy with disability and freedom at its center. It’s being shown at the diTHIS! Film Series. The Series showcases films on disability that you probably won’t see anywhere else.
The description for El Cochecito says it is, “a dark comedy about an old man who would kill [...]
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Change in the Zeitgeist
For the second time this week I’ve seen reference to how someone’s disability helped to make a new product or song.
This is the exact opposite of the super crip or the overcomer. It shows a reality that I know. When you’ve got a disability you have to be inventive.
The first is Doc Pomus, a wheelchair [...]
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Old Attitudes
from a disability perspective.
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Sunday, August 12, 2007
Old Attitudes
The word amputees and surfing in an LA Times headline on my newsreader caught my eye this morning. It was a nice, little feel-good piece on veterans with recent amputations going surfing. A swimsuit manufacturer sponsored a weekend to teach them how to surf.
Just as I was about [...]
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Orange Flags?!??
I’ve been fascinated by the wheelchair fashion of a number of our locals. Two necessary items they use to decorate their power chairs or scooters are American flags in different configurations and an orange signal flag. Interesting, yes, but not a fashion I necessarily subscribe to. Well, perhaps that might change if the writers to [...]
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