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Paper Short Abstract:

How might the act of 'witnessing' be perceptively narrowed, absented or weaponised by the state? Which pedagogies of witnessing are being normalised, both within bureaucratic and academic contexts? Subsequently, what forms of disability epistemologies are being practised, [re]produced or resisted?

Paper Abstract:

In this paper, I explore the sticky complexity of witnessing [and, therefore, representing] disability, both within the contexts of bureaucratic social welfare assessments, and within anthropological research itself. Primarily, I draw upon my fieldwork with recipients of the UK disability benefit ‘Personal Independence Payment’ (PIP).

PIP claimants must complete etic paperwork, as well as attend in-person assessments, to determine whether or not they are eligible for financial support. What ‘counts’ as disability is pre-determined, with claimants subsequently required to fit this category. Disability becomes once-twice-thrice removed from the textured biography of the disabled person it claims to represent. Witnessing is perceptively narrowed through form-filling, and actively weaponised through in-person assessments.

This removal of direct interaction can be described using what Kleinman, Das and Locke refer to as a ‘voyeuristic outcome of constructing suffering’ (1997: pp.xviii). The flattening of a disabled claimant’s biography against the assessor’s criteria removes the necessity for the “socio[ethical] responsibility of real engagement [with the complex dimensions of disablement]”. Rather, the absence of the PIP assessor to witness the ‘suffering’ of a disabled claimant fashions an a-social space which “[removes the] ethical demand upon those who witness it” (Throop, 2012: pp.160).

Given this significant interactional tension, I use this space to explore the following questions: what types of disability knowledge(s) are being constructed through weaponised witnessing? How might disability benefit claimants practice, [re]produce or resist this institutional gaze? Furthermore, through witnessing systemic violence, what dimensions of disability are focused upon or overlooked through the anthropological gaze?