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Stuttering and Sexism

2/19/2015

2 Comments

 
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The conceptualization of dysfluent speech as ugly or unpleasant is an effective tool in the marginalization of stutterers. It is particularly salient for women, who face intersecting and compounding marginalization in patriarchal society. The appearance, behavior, and speech of women are much more heavily policed. Norms of emphasized femininity dictate that appropriate roles for women are submissive, docile, and aligned with specific standards of physical appearance. Understanding gender-based oppression is critical to discussing the ways that women experience speech discrimination and their role in activism.

Patriarchal society praises women for behaving and appearing in ways that accentuate their vulnerability and diminish their confidence. The misconception that stuttering is caused by shyness, anxiety, or low self-esteem is used to reinforce the belief that women are intellectually, emotionally, and psychologically frail in relation to men. A woman’s response to her own stuttering is more positively sanctioned if she expresses shame, and women much more than men are encouraged to suppress stuttering, even at the expense of communication and expression.

The gendered differences in perception of confidence among stutterers illustrate an important facet of patriarchy, that the perpetuation of a binary system necessitates the treatment of masculinity and femininity as mutually exclusive categories. Vulnerability and low self-esteem are positively sanctioned in adherence to standards of emphasized femininity, while dysfluent men are negatively sanctioned for expressing shame, as it is a deviant performance of hegemonic masculinity. This type of binary-based double standard is visible in speech and behavior more broadly. For example: similar actions by leaders are labeled as assertive when performed by men and abrasive when performed by women.

Emphasized femininity as an embodied practice involves adherence to specific norms regarding physical appearance and self-image. Embodied practices of vulnerability encourage low self-image and the persistent focus on improvement of physical appearance rather than acceptance or pride. It is far more widely accepted for women to participate in and support crash diets and weight loss regimens than campaigns for body positivity or health at every size. Women’s public engagement with stuttering is similarly influenced. Medical-model self-help groups that focus on avoiding stuttering and improving self-acceptance are much more accessible than radical activism, which rejects the notion of stutterers as flawed and demands institutional change. For women, rejecting patriarchal standards of body image and body presentation is itself a radical act. To give up the work of therapy, assimilation, and internalized shame and instead be proud of a dysfluent voice is a highly deviant act. It is much more difficult for women than men to obtain legitimacy when they do not view stuttering as a defect.

It is important to account for the effect of gender-based oppression on dysfluent women when considering the experience of stutterers more broadly. It is also important to consider that the experience of trans and non-binary people is different from that of cisgender women. Intersectional analyses must also account for privilege and oppression based on race, class, age, sexuality, and other disabilities. When we talk about ableism and speech discrimination general, abstract terms, the nuance of intersecting oppressions can often be masked. Too often, we talk about pride and activism in ways that do not account for ways we experience privilege, and the ways in which others are oppressed.   

-Erin

2 Comments
Kristin Rodier
2/20/2015 07:21:52 am

Excellent post! Much to think about! I love the analogy to fat activism (that's what I made of this!) and think there needs to be more work on the (dis)ability/fat intersection. I was wondering two things:
First, whether you would like this amazing post by Lucas Crawford: http://www.originalplumbing.com/index.php/society-culture/food/item/566-slender-trouble
In a way, I think, it gets at some of the issues I have had with HAES (healthism and "proving" that fat people aren't (dis)abled).
And Second, whether you've thought about specifically [ital/]feminist[/ital] work on women's speech like the critique (and backlash to the critique!) of "uptalk." Is the feminist critique of uptalk assuming a fluent speaker? How would the feminist critique of uptalk change if we centre other kinds of speech?
I know my second thing here is more of a question for the intersection where disability meets feminism, whereas your post is about how feminism is relevant to disability (slight difference, though intersectional analysis is always fraught when speaking of identity claims). Anyway, lots to think about! Keep up the thoughtful work, all you didIstutterers!!

Reply
Erin
2/21/2015 01:23:20 pm

Thanks for your response! I’m really happy to see folks engaging with this.
I appreciate you linking the Crawford post; so much of that resonates with me as well. HAES has a lot of room for critique, but I am most interested in the way backlash against HAES is different from backlash against non-health focused body positive/fat positive activism. The main analogy I am trying to draw is between the HAES critique of weight-based medical discrimination and the DIS critique/rejection of fluency-based speech therapy, and how that relates to gender.
Regarding your second question – I’m not sure, but I would guess that the feminist critique largely assumes fluency. I’ve only read a small portion of the work on uptalk and I haven’t come across anything that suggests otherwise. Feminist sociology is really just starting to talk about disability, so I’m not surprised.

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