Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw provided the following definition of intersectionality:”Intersectionality is a metaphor for understanding the ways that multiple forms of inequality or disadvantage sometimes compound themselves and create obstacles that often are not understood among conventional ways of thinking.”
Discuss specific examples from the resources that illustrate the intersection of disability with other identity aspects.
Each person interviewed offers a unique sense of the ways disability intersects with other parts of their identity to shape their lives. Ade Adepitan portrays a society that has not overcome or rooted out systemic discrimination. He talks about the racist and ableist abuse he dealt with as he was growing up, being verbally assaulted in the street for either his identity as a black person, or as a disabled person, and often both at the same time.
For Christine Sum King, her identity as a deaf person is fundamental to her work as an artist, performer and parent. Her art visualises her experience and frustration as she interacts with the hearing world. She recounts the way she was denied access to an arts education all the way through her school life, and how barriers to everything from entertainment to parenting can be caused by lack of access provision. Equally, she discusses pros and cons of the way that deaf culture can become a bubble, shielding you from interacting with the hearing world.
Evaluate how these intersections impact the lived experiences of the interviewees.
Navigating their intersectionality has had profound impacts on each person’s life.
For Chay Brown it has made forming relationships more complex. “Because I have a hidden disability ….learning the real subtleties of the certain nonverbal communication that can go on between gay men in certain context… (was) something I had to get over my anxiety about “ ( Brown 2023) He discusses the kinds of provisions that have helped him and others participate in LGBTQ+ events, key to learning the culture of your community and finding your role models. He is now director of operations and healthcare within the organisation TransActual, working with a heightened understanding and empathy for those with different healthcare challenges.
Ade Adepitan’s identity as a disabled athlete has given him a platform as an athlete, broadcaster and activist to share his experience as a disabled black person with a wide audience. He demonstrates what is possible when barriers to participation are removed. Despite his success, he reflects that if he should become a parent in the future, he couldn’t promise his child that they would live in a society free of discrimination .
Consider any recurring themes or differing perspectives highlighted in the interviews.
Differing perspectives:
Sum Kim offers a European perspective and feels positively supported and enabled to work as an artist by the government. She identifies provision such as affordable studio space and childcare as key to her ability to create work. She contrasts this to her American friends working with a debt burden that limits their lives.
Adepitan identifies the potential for organisations such as Black Lives Matter and the Paralympic movement to intersect and learn from each other, working together to tackle discrimination in society as a whole.
Brown considers the barriers to gaining acceptance within a defined community. He highlights lived experience as a valued and essential perspective when creating truly welcoming and inclusive spaces for everyone.
Recurring themes:
Each person highlights the need for the visibility of marginalised groups. As Sum Kim says of her large-scale work “ scale equals visibility and that has the ability to shape social norms” (Sum Kim 2023)
Each speaker touches on the need for funding to provide support and resources, enabling increased access in different ways.
Each person shows how mainstream society has been and often still is, an aggressive, inhospitable environment presenting barriers to their growth and means of expression. As Adepitan says “I am disabled because society has not allowed me to shine “ (Adepitan 2020)
They all note that providing access is often universally inclusive act useful to everyone . As Brown’s interviewer says “ If things are accessible for disabled people they’re gonna be accessible for everyone”
Each speaker is taking part in big social events that centre disabled people such as the Paralympics, Para pride and the Manchester Festival. They describe the positive impact these occasions have on communities, increasing visibility and opportunities to showcase and inspire success.
List the disability considerations in your own teaching context, drawing on UAL data and your own experience
In my teaching across the performance programme, we work with several students with learning differences such as dyslexia, dyscalculia and mental health issues including anxiety, autism and ADHD. We also have a deaf student. It feels like the number of students with an Individual Support Agreements has risen each year, which tallies with the UAL Equality Diversity and Inclusion report of 2024/25 ( 13% of students declared as disabled in 2021/22 now 18% in 2024/25).
Talking to students, Hannah Leddy , our disability advisor, and increasingly, working with disabled actors as a designer, has inspired me to adapt my teaching to be accessible to all students. This often leads to new ways of working such as exploring surfaces and forms with different senses and a new appreciation. I want to learn more about making the studio environment as inclusive as possible, and to communicate to students the need to represent and visualise a diverse a range of stories and storytellers in our making and design practice.
Bibliography
- Crenshaw, Kimberle´ Williams (1989) “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics.” University of Chicago Legal Forum 1989:139–67, p. 149
- Brown, C. (2023). ‘Intersectionality in Focus: Empowering Voices during UK Disability History Month 2023’. Interview with Chay Brown. Interviewed for Parapride, 13 December. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yID8_s5tjc ( Accessed April 2025)
- Adepitan, A. (2020). ‘Ade Adepitan gives amazing explanation of systemic racism’. Interview with Ade Adepitan. Interviewed by Nick Webborn for Paralympics GB, 16 October. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAsxndpgagU ( Accessed April 2025)
- Kim, C. S. (2023) ‘Christine Sun Kim in “Friends & Strangers” – Season 11 | Art21’. Interview with Christine Sun Kim. Interviewed for Art21, 1 November. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2NpRaEDlLsI&t=1s ( Accessed April 2025)
- UAL Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Report 2021/22 Pg.27 Available at: chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.arts.ac.uk/?a=389423 (Accessed May 2025)
- UAL Active Dashboards 2024/25 Available at : https://dashboards.arts.ac.uk/dashboard/ActiveDashboards/DashboardPage.aspx?dashboardid=5c6bb274-7645-4500-bb75-7e334f68ff24&dashcontextid=638681486282992055 ( Accessed May 2025)
