“I’m not even sure sometimes - is he disabled or not?”
Our non-disabled participants reported actively engaging with new thoughts about disability. Jan raised the concept of visibility, or discernibility – looking around the group, at times she wasn’t sure who had or didn’t have a disability. Another participant, Peter, echoed this feeling “it’s not really that evident. It’s not like I can go from ‘disabled’ person [motioning to one side] to ‘abled’ person [motioning to another]. This is the impact of the label free space. Another participant commented on working creatively together- as a new experience for her. She enjoyed this and again, meeting new people while painting together was a positive result.
The same excitement was reported by the artists with disabilities, which highlights the inclusive method, where one group does not necessarily have more power, but both work towards some common interest (Bigby et al, 2014). One participant suggested that the term ‘disability’ ‘boxes’ people into one definition, and doesn’t allow people to be themselves. Her personal definition of disability was that some things pose more challenges to some people. She contrasted this with the perspective that most people have at least one area of their life that is challenging. She thinks that labelling someone as ‘disabled’ is unfortunate because there are many preconceptions attached to that word that are stigmatising. Physical disabilities are those we can immediately see when we meet someone, making it easier to help that person. But for social barriers, people are less likely to help someone because it is less easily noticed, or if it is noticed some people may not know how to act or find it socially awkward. Other evidence of interest from the mainstream group was found in spikes around these encounters on our project social media site11https://www.facebook.com/StoryBehindEveryNZ.YOUth – stretching engagement beyond the face to face, situational engagement. These results will be reported more in-depth in another publication.