Language: Ableism in Words

Growing up in my Taiwanese American household, I never knew the official Mandarin word for disability. When my family members were upset or were referring to a disabled person, they would say Zhi zhang, 智障, meaning “retarded” or someone with a low intelligence quotient, and they would also use the word Wen-ti, 問題, meaning problem. During family conversations, I would hear others refer to a disabled person as the person with a Wen-ti. I’ve lost most of my Mandarin; I can still understand my parents when they speak it, but I am unable to speak it fluently. Mandarin and English are blended in my family: my mother speaks Mandarin; my father speaks English, and my siblings and I respond in English. Whenever I heard the derogatory terms from my parents or relatives’ lips, it never sat well with me, and I felt ashamed because I knew they probably used similar language when referring to me. I recall when my mother voiced my similarity to my grandma, Ah-yi, whose mental health drives everyone away from her. My Ah-yi refuses to seek mental health help because of the stigma, and she chooses to bury it. I’ve always been the anxious one in my family, and I felt different. I knew there was something off, but I pushed it down. It really wasn’t until I came to college where I explored the possibility of seeking help to learn how to live with my anxiety. After taking Disability Narratives last semester and attending therapy sessions to work through my experiences with anxiety and trauma, I began thinking about language. How does language heal? How does language harm? My first step was learning the word for disability in Mandarin. In a recent conversation, I called my mother to ask her about the word for disability in Mandarin; she told me the official word is canji, 殘疾. Upon further research, I realized that term is also problematic because as researcher Dai Wangyun mentions about the word canji that was used from the 1990s, “canji is not perfect either, as it insinuates that disabled people have some kind of incurable ailment that renders them abnormal. Unfortunately, this is how many Chinese still view disability today.”[1]

As I begun doing research, it was difficult because I realized that most of the research on disability in Taiwan is in Mandarin. I do wish that I learned Mandarin, so that I could access those articles on disability and dissect and understand the radicals in Mandarin words. As I’ve shared in my “Introduction” blog post, I lost my Mandarin because I didn’t want to speak it anymore when I was in middle school because I saw the language as a barrier to fitting in with my white friends at school. I associated Mandarin with the cruelty of my Ah-yi, and my own father refused to let us learn Mandarin because he saw the flaws in the Asian culture. I didn’t see the harm, at first, in my father’s decision because I longed to be separate from my Taiwanese heritage. But now, I’m gradually learning to disassociate from being ashamed of my culture and listening to my father’s views. My father speaks to us in his own English, which is a blend of Mandarin phrases and words directly translated to English, which does not always make sense to me and my siblings. Even though, we can understand Mandarin, he chooses not to speak it to us. He views English as being the language of superiority and Mandarin as inferiority. I want to challenge that because it is in fact, people who use language to their power. People can use language for love and acceptance, or they can use it as weapons to outcast and belittle others.

The Mandarin words for disabled people in China and Taiwan hold some subtle differences. Steven quotes “National Taipei University sociologist Chang Heng-hao” who stated that in the 1980s, disabled people were referred to as “canfei” (the first radical means disabled” and the second means “worthlessness” or “uselessness”.[2] However, the terms are now “canzhang” which means “disabled and impaired” and “zhang’aizhe” which means “people with disabilities.”[3] Wangyun mentions how disabled people are referred to in China as “canzhang (replacing the second character with one meaning “obstacle or barrier)” or they use “shenxin zhang’ai” which means “physically or mentally obstructed.” The “canzhang” word is used in both countries, but the meanings are slightly different in the second radical. I’m thinking about translation and what gets lost in translation from Mandarin to English. Sometimes, there is no direct translation.

The changing terms for disabled people imply more awareness about disability; however, there is more work to be done with accessibility. Wangyun writes, “It’s not that people with disabilities are inherently flawed; it’s that our environment is not accessible enough.”[4] She shares a story of her wheelchair using friend who stated how she avoids using the public bathrooms: “I want to go, but can’t find anywhere that I can, which makes me feel a little less human.”[5]Accessibility is a human right. Her friend’s rights were not granted—they were ignored. The lack of accessibility and human rights is appalling, and the need for accessibility, the need to change the mindset surrounding disability is urgent. Her mention of accessibility reminds me of the disability activist Alice Wong’s words when she visited Skidmore earlier this month: she called for more accessibility in all mediums: closed captioning and image descriptions for films and photographs.

My mother talked about how in public settings, people use certain terms, but in private conversation, the terms would transform to “trash, person with a problem, loser, low class, and stupid.” The highly offensive terms were said in private, but it doesn’t justify anything. The excuse of ignorance and indifference is not acceptable before or now. The language surrounding disability is highly offensive and degrading that it bars and scares people from seeking help. In my own family, my family members never dared to seek mental health help because of the shame and guilt associated with it. My great grandmother did seek help, but she did so secretly, and no one talked about it except when behind closed doors and in low tone, hushed whispers. I never knew that my great grandmother sought help—my mother told me recently. She didn’t go into specifics, but I wonder if she wrote letters to document her experience, if she found language as a source of solace like me. My mother told me about the haunting ways people lock their family members who have mental disorders in rooms because of the shame surrounding disability.

Language and thought are intertwined; the ableist words propels harmful actions and beliefs surrounding disabled individuals. Able-bodied people may unaware of the problematic nature of their inquiries and beliefs. Writer and activist Eli Clare, in his memoir Brilliant Imperfections (2017), writes about the connection between judgement on body-minds and language: “All of our body-minds are judged in one way or another, found to be normal or abnormal, valuable or disposable, healthy or unhealthy.” Clare presents the dichotomies to elucidate how disabled people are heavily judged and seen as one or another. [6] Clare makes the readers complete the labor of questioning the definitions of “normal” or “healthy” because they can be used in ableist ways. He provides a specific example about how people question him about his disability in condescending manners: “Prurient curiosity takes the place of courtesy, respect, connection”. [7] Continuing, he writes “In the U.S. no one asks: […] ‘Why are you healthy all the time’”. [8] The barrage of questions that he receives, not only singles him out, but also elucidates how others view his disability as “unhealthy.” The idea of “healthy” becomes ableist because who defines what healthy is or isn’t; who decides if one is healthy or not? What are the criteria to fit into the definition of healthy? Appearance has a lot to do with it for one; people judge and make assumptions based on appearance without getting to know the person.

In one of the journal articles that I read, I learned about the history of the disability laws in Taiwan. I was curious about the language employed because I found that the language reflected the perception of disability. Professors Tasing Chiu and Hsiao’s article traces the history of disability in Taiwan: “the first disability related law in Taiwan” was “the Can-Zhang Welfare Act, which commenced a full-scale medical disability assessment, and a disability identification card.”[9] The word used Can-zhang means “incomplete and defective,” which implies an othering and problematic view of disabled people.[10] The law wasn’t effective in propelling disability rights, and later the law was revised in 1997 to the name the “Shen-Xin Zhang-Ai-Zhe (meaning people with mental and physical disabilities) Protection Act” which increased the budget for social welfare of disabled people.”[11] The law was renamed in 2007 to “People with Disability Rights Protection Act.”[12] Even with the revision of the act to a respectful term, the treatment of disabled people still needs work. I noticed that some discrepancies between the terms used for disability in the laws in certain articles. I wonder if there isn’t an official disability term, or it changes depending on the country, or I’m missing something because I don’t know Mandarin well. I recall my mother telling me about how the words for disability changes depending on what disability you are referring to. I have more research to do.

After reading about the laws, I was drawn to learning more about the current experience of disabled people in Taiwan. How is life for disabled people in Taiwan? How accessible are the cities? Have the perceptions of disability changed or not? Some positive changes currently implemented are that Taiwan runs the Taipei MRT system that allows for wheelchair access, grants long-term care and a “disability identification card to retain governmental support” for disabled people, and fosters conversations between the Disabled People’s Organizations and the government on disability concerns.[13] However, as Sociology Professor at National Taipei University Heng-hao Chang states, “society views disability as an individual problem and personal tragedy; thus, “disability welfare policies strongly rely on the family’s responsibility to provide support and care.”[14] The stigma around disability dissuades disabled people from seeking assistance in applying for an identification card or going out in public. The work to destroy the disability stigma is ongoing, and something people can do is to be aware of the language that they use.

As one of the English Representatives at my college, I was in a meeting with the department head where she passed out a list of the upcoming events, and my eye was immediately drawn to the Alice Wong event. I couldn’t believe my eyes because I read her anthology titled Disability Narratives: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century in Disability Narratives, and now I would be able to hear her speak on Zoom. On October 4th, I attended the “In Conversation with Alice Wong” Zoom event where she spoke about the necessity to be conscious about the language of disability that we use in our conversations. It was a surreal and lovely experience being in the same Zoom room and being able to witness her sense of humor and openness to sharing her beliefs and goals. She stated, “Language can be ableist.” She pointed to the example of the word “crazy.” She called for people to be mindful for the language that they are using because of the connotations of “crazy.” Neurodivergent people have been labeled “crazy,” a highly charged and derogatory word. Ableism survives because people continue, to not only hold biases about disability, but they use problematic word choices in their conversations without thinking about the historical and current connotations. As I was sitting in the Zoom room, I felt a whirlwind of emotions: I was sad, grateful, and happy. Wong’s words about language resonated with me because we’re all surrounded by words every moment of every day, and her reminder to be conscious about the words that we choose is key to keep in mind.

I also found Wong’s words about the pressing need for storytelling and stories written by disabled people of color to be impactful. Wong voiced, “There is a lack of representation in disability with people of color,” and there is “centering of whiteness. There’s some vicious hierarchy of oppression that keeps people silent.” The oppression that Wong speaks about involves actions of oppression but also dangerous language. However, she also warned against “overcoming narratives” because there are inherently ableist as they highlight disability as something that needs to be overcome. The language in overcoming narratives uphold this harmful sense that disabled people must cater to able-bodied individuals’ ideas of triumph and usefulness. Another layer of harm is the idea of white people favoring immigrant or people of color narratives about overcoming adversity. Those success stories are quite dangerous because they promote this narrative of seeing people of color and/or disabled people of color as tokens based on their worth that is judged against the standard of whiteness.

The words that we employ matter. As a writer and poet, I’m paying acute attention to the phrases and words that I weave into my stories, poems, conversations, and thoughts.

 

[1] Dai Wangyun. “Invisible Millions: China’s Unnoticed Disabled People: Most Chinese see disability as something to be overcome or pitied, not something to be accommodated through accessible infrastructure,” Sixth Tone, (2017), https://medium.com/sixth-tone/invisible-millions-chinas-unnoticed-disabled-people-b54a7f361605.

[2] Steven Crook. “Accessibility for Taiwan’s Disabled: A Work in Progress,” AmCham Taiwan, (2018), https://topics.amcham.com.tw/2018/12/accessibility-for-taiwans-disabled-a-worked-in-progress/.

[3] Cook, 1.

[4] Wangyun, 1.

[5] Wangyun, 1.

[6] Eli Clare, Brilliant Imperfections: Grappling with Cure (North Carolina: Duke University Press, 2017), 69.

[7] Clare, 151.

[8] Clare, 151.

[9] Tasing Chiu and Hsiao-Yu Sun, “Definition and Categorization of Disability in Taiwan: A Historical Review,” Development and Society 46, no. 1 (2017): 186, https://www.jstor.org/stable/90011217.

[10] Chiu and Sun, 186.

[11] Chiu and Sun, 187.

[12] Heng-hao Chang. “How Well Does Taiwan Support People with Disabilities?”, Taiwan Insight, (2021), https://taiwaninsight.org/2021/03/09/how-well-does-taiwan-support-people-with-disabilities/.

[13] Chang, 1.

[14] Chang, 1.

Bibliography

Chang, Heng-hao. “How Well Does Taiwan Support People with Disabilities?”. Taiwan Insight, (2021). https://taiwaninsight.org/2021/03/09/how-well-does-taiwan-support-people-with-disabilities/.

Chiu, Tasing and Hsiao-Yu Sun. “Definition and Categorization of Disability in Taiwan: A Historical Review.” Development and Society 46, no. 1 (2017): 179-194. https://www.jstor.org/stable/90011217.

Clare, Eli, Brilliant Imperfections: Grappling with Cure. North Carolina: Duke University Press, 2017.

Crook, Steven. “Accessibility for Taiwan’s Disabled: A Work in Progress.” AmCham Taiwan, (2018). https://topics.amcham.com.tw/2018/12/accessibility-for-taiwans-disabled-a-worked-in-progress/.

Wangyun, Dai. “Invisible Millions: China’s Unnoticed Disabled People: Most Chinese see disability as something to be overcome or pitied, not something to be accommodated through accessible infrastructure.” Sixth Tone, (2017). https://medium.com/sixth-tone/invisible-millions-chinas-unnoticed-disabled-people-b54a7f361605.