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The Process and Power in Naming: Who Decides? Sarah Hill University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) Disability studies is an under-theorized discipline with little public acknowledgment, understanding or awareness. The prevailing ignorance and societal assumptions, myths, stereotypes, and discrimination are pervasive. With the “Deaf President Now” movement at Gallaudet University in 1988 and the passing and implementation of the American with Disabilities Act in 1990, a civil rights movement for the field of disability has emerged. As a result, recognition of the rights and humanity of disabled people has improved. However, countless issues remain. The most significant issue for the disabled population is the social construction of disability: the problem of disability is not the disability itself, but societal responses to disability (Longmore 1985:421; Shapiro 1993:5; Davis 1995; Obvrim 2002:26). Such negative attitudes are demonstrated in naming, labeling, and language practices associated with disability (Longmore 1985; Peters 1986:25; Zola 1993; Foreman 2005). In this paper, I examine the language of disability and the process of naming and labeling. The project begins with an investigation of labeling theory. In an attempt to understand the process of labeling in the struggle for social equality, I will study how other marginalized groups (Black Americans, women, and homosexuals) dealt with negative labels assigned by majority groups and, ultimately, asserted their right to determine how and when they should be labeled. I will then examine the process of labeling in disability to determine if such a transition from being labeled to owning labels has occurred and whether it is a signal of growing social power and group pride. The overall trend in reassessing and renaming contributes to the success of the disability rights movement: “Reappropriating words to redefine [persons with disabilities] and thinking about ‘the power of negative language’ is a sign of a new and thriving group identity (Shapiro 1993:34). The rallying cries for general and specific disability language may be the appropriate language that has eluded the disability rights movement in the past (Peters 1986:22).
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