Philosophy of Disability

This course is an introduction to the ethical and political issues concerning disability. It aims to provide students with a set of tools to think critically about the connections between our ideas about disability, interpersonal relationships and political institutions. The first part of the course explores different conceptions of disability, and their relationships to ideas such as impairment, disorder, disease, dependence, disadvantage. The second part of the course considers how these conceptions interact with or shape the fundamental ideas around which our interpersonal relationships and common institutions are built. What standards of care and non-interference are reasonable? What does it mean to be independent, free, equal or have political representation? How might these ideas be re-configured if we conceptualize disability differently?