»Und dann hab’ ich gemerkt, wie viel Spaß das auch macht«

Abstract

Wheelchairs are means of transportation. They have four wheels, a metal frame, a fabric seating and a seat cushion. Wheelchairs can be seen as convenient and useful. But in dominant discourses wheelchairs are overshadowed by the problematic, by fear and social alarm. Wheelchairs signal something, e.g. passivity, dependency, being trapped. In opposition to this there are discourses that promote the wheelchair as a liberating, mundane and as an embodied assistive device that (re-)enables an independent life. However, a lot of severely walking impaired people hesistate for years, until they opt for using a wheelchair. This contribution is looking at wheelchair acquisition and acceptance processes and their societal framework. It includes preliminary results of a qualitative interview study with people with walking impairments and tries to unravel discourses of disciplining and of the internalisation of stigma and ableism.