Tri County Relevance of Non-Fiction Reading on Experience
Excerpts from Service Entries that describe the relationship between our non-fiction readings and our volunteer work:
Extraordinary Bodies
-Excerpt from Amanda's Journal Entries: I’m not sure that I can really relate this to anything we have read, since I dont have any experiences at the Tri-County Association this week to draw from. I almost wonder if maybe the people from the Association who give us work to do have been misinterpreting our intentions and thought we merely wanted to help out with the Association as a whole and that we didn’t want to have the interaction with the other workers. If this is a possibility, maybe they think we feel uncomfortable around the workers because of their disabilities, in which case they would feel as though they were helping us to “avoid anomalous things” (35) through segregation, as suggested by Mary Douglas in her concept of dirt from “Extraordinary Bodies". That it the only excuse I could possibly think of for them not allowing us to have any interaction at all during this past visit.
-Excerpt from Alicia's Journal Entries: What most related to many discussions we have had in class was the fact that Linda told me how she felt extremely disrespected by many people who come into their work. “People think just because you can’t see or you have a vision problem that you have something wrong mentally, or an impairment in the head,” Linda said. I thought this directly related to many of the stories from class and points made about how “normal” people view the disabled. If people are not exactly how one thinks the norm should be, one often looks down on people or treats them as un-human. Since Linda once could see and lived her life just as the norm does and now cannot see and live the way she used to it proves how easy it is to become part of this group. Often in class we have spoken of how perhaps many people fear the disabled or look at disabilities in such a unique manner because it is a group we can become a part of at any point. Overall, the observations I made were not nearly as useful as interacting closely with someone who made it clear to me that many assumptions made in fiction occur in real life.
-Excerpt from Lisa's Journal Entries: I am able to connect my learning experience with many of the discussions we have had in class. One of the biggest connections I made was the fact that because of the physical characteristics of the blind, many assumptions are made about them. Rose Marie Garland Thomas talks about this in Extraordinary Bodies. People assume that the blind live completely different life styles than those who do not have disabilities, and they also assume that they cannot perform on the job as well as others.
