Othering, ableism and disability: A discursive analysis of co-workers’ construction of colleagues with visible impairments
通过访谈19名管理者和43名同事，分析健全同事如何通过将残疾同事与“其他不同人群”（如变性人、同性恋、移民）类比来建构他者化，揭示健全中心主义话语与包容话语的矛盾。
The aim of this article is to explore how able-bodied co-workers engage in the ‘othering’ of colleagues with impairments. Taking a discursive analytical approach, the article examines interviews with 19 managers and 43 colleagues who all worked closely with an employee with cerebral palsy in 13 different work organizations. The primary finding of the article is that co-workers spontaneously refer to other ‘different’ people (e.g. transvestites, homosexuals, immigrants) when talking about a colleague with visible impairments. This finding suggests that disability is simultaneously a discursive category (i.e. the discourse of ableism prevents co-workers from talking about the impairments of a colleague) and a material phenomenon (i.e. employees with impairments are a distinct category of employees in the eyes of the co-workers). Othering of employees with disabilities thus demonstrates contradictory discourses of ableism (which automatically produce difference) and tolerance and inclusiveness (which automatically render it problematic to talk about difference).