Article
Social Theory & Health (2007) 5, 228–244. doi:10.1057/palgrave.sth.8700090
How Speaking Shapes Person and World: Analysis of the Performativity of Discourse in the Field of Disability
Myriam Winance1
1CERMES, Centre de Recherche Médecine, Sciences, Santé et Société, CNRS UMR 8169, EHESS, INSERM U750, France. E-mail: winance@vjf.cnrs.fr
Abstract
This article examines the role and importance of discourse in the field of disability. Based on Austin's contributions to pragmatics, it shows how discourse, being descriptive, prescriptive and embodied, creates differences for individual people. Words define a person's world, body and (dis)abilities. They thus define the way in which this world can (or cannot) be changed through political action and by creating a group. This analysis of discourse leads to the question of the speaker's responsibility: who is allowed to say 'what' and what will the strength and efficacy of his/her discourse be?
Keywords:
disability, discourse, pragmatics, Austin, person
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