Dr. Kelly Fritsch, Carleton University
Dr. Anne McGuire, University of Toronto

In what ways do contemporary individualized spectrums of risk simultaneously constrain and expand possibilities for disability justice and the future of disability? Building on our previous work (2019) documenting the institutional history of the sperm bank and legacies of eugenics that examined how parents mark the fate of their donor-conceived children on a graded spectrum of genetic and psychiatric risk, we reflect on how spectral risk is informed by the haunting dread of disability. We seek to further understand the contemporary reorganization of disability along a continuum of spectral risk in order to delineate how disability haunting can enable us to better attend to the effects of the past and present in such a way that provokes a more collectively just future.

Fritsch, Kelly and Anne McGuire. 2019. “Risk and the Spectral Politics of Disability.” Body & Society. 25(4): 29-54.

This seminar is part of the Disability Futurity series organised by the Carleton University Disability Research Group in collaboration with the Liverpool Hope University Centre for Culture & Disability Studies.