[Xmca-l] Re: FW: FW: Re: poverty/class

[Huw Lloyd]

On 26 March 2014 11:47, Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu> wrote:

> I wrote Mike the following note offlist, and he suggested I send it to the
> group:
> On Tue, Mar 25, 2014 at 11:17 AM, Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu<mailto:
> smago@uga.edu>> wrote:
> Hi Mike, I'm responding off-list to the article you sent. I make the
> following observation with the awareness that I have to police my own
> discursive representations of people of difference because it can be hard
> to break away from so much social and discursive conditioning.
>
> On p. 89, after working hard to challenge deficit perspectives on
> difference, you refer to "the issue of neurodevelopmental disorder such as
> ASD," a term you repeat just before the subhead. To me, the term "disorder"
> indicates deficit, rather than what I think of as a different order. I also
> think you're locating the problems that follow from being different in the
> individual, rather than in the society that makes a deficit judgment of
> difference (LSV on defectology being channeled here).
>
> Just wanted to alert you to what I see as an inconsistency in your
> phrasing and thus perhaps thinking. Best,Peter
>

Peter and all,

I doubt anyone on this list will fail to appreciate the potential harm in
the label "disorder".  This may be doubly true if the syndrome has its own
order!  Where we might draw our lines of inquiry, however, is whether we
should iron out such lexical defects or whether we should leave them in to
remind us of the relativity and context of their use.  That is, should we
treat our (lexical) "defects" as defects or differences?

For example, is it not the case that the advantage of the "mathew effect"
is also a dis-advantage?  As an example of the dis-advantage Mathew is also
cited as saying that "it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a
needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God" [1].  Now,
personally, I perceive "defects" in this quotation. However, to me, they
are "useful defects" because I have some knowledge of why I think they are
defects.

Best,
Huw


[1] http://biblehub.com/matthew/19-24.htm