This collection is sort of the Superman of studies—relating disability to the material world around us and showing us, specifically, how this clash of bodies and space shapes the way that we understand and talk about disability.
In other words, our world is a space that is both linguistic and material, man. And a building with steps only leading to the front door speaks just as loudly as any medical diagnosis about the way that we think bodies should function. If there are steps only, then this is an example of a material rhetoric saying that all "normal" bodies should be able to climb them. No freaks allowed.
The authors in this diverse collection explore everything—from the way that our medical language shapes the way that we both view and behave in our bodies to the way that classroom layouts, with all desks facing the teacher far away at front, suggest that the "only right" way to learn is to listen to and watch the teacher (a proposition that excludes, in one fell swoop, deaf, visually impaired, and learning disabled students).
The essays in Embodied Rhetorics require us to ask how the world we live in is shaping our understanding and treatment of our bodies and those of others, especially when it comes to disability.
How do we define what disability is? Is it in our language? Is it in the way we construct and move through our world? And if "disability" is a product not just of how we speak about it but of every practical, material aspect of our lives—from the way we educate to the way we raise our families—then where do we begin in making a more just world for all types of bodies?
Hard questions, Shmoopers.