Promotion Fest: Dis/ability

[dark_administrator]

To continue with our celebration of characters with intersectional identities, we'd like to welcome lightgetsin and sasha_feather, members of access_fandom's moderator team, and who are joining us in highlighting chromatic characters with a wide range of disabilities. Like other intersectional identities, characters of color with disabilities are subject to multiple – and sometimes competing – types of oppression.

And the label “disability” is, of course, not monolithic: a disability may be visible or invisible, it may be physical or psychological or cognitive or emotional, it may be understood and medicalized or unnamed and ignored. These play a role in the nature of oppression, and just as importantly in the lived experiences of chromatic people with disabilities.

We'd also like to consider the ways that treatment of various disabilities can be racialized, and the ways that ableism disproportionately impacts communities of color on an institutional level. Included in the Starting Points section below are several examples, as discussed by the members of FWD/Forward.

Starting Points

• access_fandom (DW community)
  
• FWD/Forward: Feminists with Disabilities: Quoted: Tim Wise, Crude Violations: BP Is Dumping Toxic Waste in Low Income Communities of Colour, Black, Hispanic, Poor people wait longer for breast cancer treatment, experience more recurrences, Jordan's Principle
  
• Some books on POC with disabilities from SUNY Albany's guide to resources on disability issues

Brainstorming

Here are some chromatic characters with disabilities that we think would make great nominations for Kaleidoscope:

• 49 Il | 49 days (Korean drama): Song Yi Kyung (depression)
  
• Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian - Sherman Alexie: Arnold Spirit
  
• Black (Indian Hindi film): Michelle McNally (deaf, blind)
  
• Bleeding Violet - Dia Reeves: Hanna Järvinen (bipolar disorder)
  
• Chocolate (Thai film): Zen (autism)
  
• Hachimitsu to Clover | Honey and Clover (anime, manga, and Japanese drama): Rika
  
• Iqbal (Indian Hindi film): Iqbal (deaf)
  
• Gangjeok-deul | Powerful Opponents (Korean drama):
  
• Mozhi (Indian Tamil film): Archana (deaf)
  
• Nae Maeumi Deullini | Can You Hear My Heart (Korean drama): Cha Dong Joo (deaf)
  
• Orange Days (Japanese drama): Hagio Sae (deaf)
  
• Sholay (Indian Hindi film): Thakur Baldev Singh (amputated arms)
  
• Taare Zameen Par (Indian Hindi film): Ishaan Awasthi (dyslexia), Ram Shankar Nikumbh (dyslexia), Rajan Damodran
  
• Metropolis: the Chase Suite and The ArchAndroid - Janelle Monae: Cindi Mayweather
  
• Toshokan Sensou | Library War (light novels and anime): Nakazawa Marié (post-lingual deafness)
  
• Mushishi (anime/manga): Ginko (missing one eye), Tanyuu (walks with a crutch)

Suggestions from commenters:

• sqbr mentions Angelic Layer (anime): Shuko Suzuhara (multiple sclerosis, uses a wheelchair)

We also maintain a list of Chromatic Disabled Characters here.

Share your squee for these fandoms or give other fandom suggestions in the comments below!

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Comments

[sqbr]

It's hardly the best portrayal of disability ever, but there's Shuko Suzuhara from the anime adaptation of Angelic Layer.

(She has MS and uses a wheelchair)

[dark_administrator]

Thank you for the suggestion! We've added it to the post.

[sqbr]

Sorry to be picky, but could you change it from "recommends" to something less positive? I mentioned it since she's an underdeveloped character who could lead to interesting fanworks, and it's a good anime overall, but I definitely wouldn't recommend the series for it's depiction of disability. If you're after unambiguous recs then it doesn't apply, and I apologise for misunderstanding the post.

[dark_administrator]

It now says "mentions" instead of "recommends"--does that work?

[sqbr]

Yes, thanks!