1. Arguing for Access: Everyday Rhetorical Labor of Disability
Annika Konrad, MA, PhD Candidate
Department of English, Composition and Rhetoric
University of Wisconsin-Madison

2. Where I’m coming from How does language empower and disempower people?
How do people in marginalized positions gain power and agency to speak and write?
A humanist perspective on blind experiences
A biological experience that I’m trying to understand from a societal perspective
Interested in how humanities can work with biological sciences to improve the lives of those with vision impairments

3. Agenda The Isolation Bubble: An Example
How did this all begin? The Community Writing Project
How did it become a research project?
More Examples from the Data
Implications

4. Isolation Bubble by Katherine Schneider
Can you imagine a time when you felt isolated or ‘othered’ by a group that you also considered yourself to be a part of?
What kinds of communication strategies does it take to break the silence surrounding someone who is the other?
What does this make you think about how disability/blindneses is perceived in everyday life?
What does this make you think about the role of communication in the daily lives of people who are blind or visually impaired?

5. Isolation Bubble by Katherine Schneider

6. THE COMMUNITY WRITING PROJECT
How did this all begin?
THE COMMUNITY WRITING PROJECT

7. Why start a writing project for blind and visually impaired people?
Mainstream narratives about blindness = superhuman, fear, cure, overcoming
Stories of everyday life not widespread in the media
What kinds of effects could everyday stories have on public perception/understanding of disability/blindness?

9. What everyday experiences have they written about?
“The Isolation Bubble”
Negotiating accommodations in the workplace
Being perceived as a beggar on the street
Learning how to be okay with asking for help
Dating as a blind person
Navigating a grocery store
Self-acceptance and self-advocacy
Deciding when to disclose, or not
On not looking blind
The gifts of disability
Parenting a blind child
Hiking with a vision impairment
Tips for eye doctors on building relationships
Being a blind grandmother

10. How did it become a research project?

11. My initial questions
What is the role of communication in the daily lives of people who are blind or visually impaired?
What do they use communication to do?
What communication strategies do they employ?
What can I learn about the social context surrounding blindness by examining interactions from the perspectives of blind and visually impaired people?

12. Study Design DATA COLLECTION Qualitative, semi-structured interviews
20 blind and visually impaired people, two blindness professionals, and one parent of a blind child
Role of communication in different contexts of their lives (school, work, social life, family, community, relationships, etc.) across the lifespan
Participant recruitment
Started with blog writers and people associated with partner organization
Criteria for participation: blind or visually impaired, friend or family member, or blindness professional

13. Study Design METHOD OF DATA ANALYSIS Grounded Theory
First round of interviews, theoretical sampling, second round of interviews
Initial coding, then focused coding
Generated 5 codes from data
Internal Rhetorical Labir
External Rhetorical Labor
Access to Institutions
Access to Social Life
Access to Information/Materials

14. More examples from the data
THE GOOD STUFF!

15. Findings
An overwhelming shared experience of bearing the burdens of communication, or everyday rhetorical labor
People have to use a wide range of rhetorical strategies to gain access to inclusion, information, institutions
Responsibility for the communicative work of gaining access is IMBALANCED
All of it almost always falls on the shoulders of the individual who is blind or visually impaired

16. Nadine – Comfort Work
If I have an expression on my face where I am very anxious, very confused, or very nervous, people will talk down to me often. I get this reaction on average whereby they speak, ‘Ma'am do you know where you're going? Are you okay?’ [speaking like speaking to a child] I get that often...But if I am very laid back, or I feel very confident, my expression is one of relaxation and comfort and if I'm okay in that sense people react to me differently. Even when they are a bit anxious and uptight when they're trying to figure me out, I'll often be the one calming them down....I've developed this very laid back demeanor which is just a part of my own personality, whereby I say things like ‘Hey, how ya doin’? My name is Nadine, what's your name? Okay, awesome. Um, I'm wondering if you could just give me a little assistance getting here or could you tell me directions on how to get here. Now it's completely fine. What we'll do is I'll just take the back of your arm, okay, just like that, all right, we are good to go, now we're groovin’!’ [all said in a very sweet, soft voice]...

17. Nadine – Having to ‘sell sell sell’
I think the first round of barriers is always getting someone accustomed to what you are able to accomplish. Getting them used to or comfortable with what your capacity actually is and what your strong suits are: so no I'm not the best person to go work this touch screen copy machine okay because it doesn't work and so what do you want me to do? And so not the best person for that but if you need a one page brief written, I'm your girl. If you need some sort of research then I'm the one to come to. If you need something to be communicated, you need a meeting to be attended, you need someone to articulate our main talking points I'm here for you. If you need me to develop the talking points I'm there for you. There are just different ways and different strengths and I've learned how to articulate that because sometimes the small administrative tasks can overshadow what you're actually capable of doing on a professional level because people will [in a snarky voice] “She can't even make em print! She can't even get things out of the printer or make copies!” or something like that, just something an eighth grader can do you know what I mean? And it's like very true, very true, however, I'm not sure if you're aware of point A, point B, point C. You have to kind of really open people's eyes to that.

18. Curtis - Killing Them With Kindness & Arming Yourself With Information
So I've learned over the years you've got to be cool about it. I'd love to tell you more about what the [State] Public Accommodations law and the Americans with Disabilities Act say and what they provide for you as a business owner as well as for me as a person with a legitimate service animal, service dog in this case. And so that's important to be able to approach that in a calm, cool, collected way so that you're not going to go on the offensive and say, you know what? You discriminated against me I'm going to sue you. We see that so often with people. They go on that offensive, they just get so mad it's like no, they [business owners] don't know. They don't know the laws. Who's going to teach them? There's nobody that teaches businesses about what the ADA Title Three says and what their responsibilities are. That's our responsibility, the civil rights law, that's so important. And I continue to do that. I continue.

19. Implications
We need to challenge the discomfort, avoidance, and uncertainty that surrounds interactions around disability.
We need to distribute responsibility for arguing for access in order to avoid the dangerous consequence of access fatigue.
We need a more distributed, anticipatory, pre-emptive, participatory, creative model of communication in pursuit of access.
All people need to share responsibility for arguing for access, regardless of inexperience, uncertainty, or ignorance.

20. Thank you!
I’d love to hear your thoughts, questions, ideas during Q&A or them to me at