Provincializing bodyminds, decolonizing disability

Author(s)

Giorgio Brocco, Laura A. Meek, Jane L. Saffitz

Abstract

In critical disability studies and crip theory, a key intervention has been to challenge Cartesian dualism by using terms such as bodyminds, body-minds, mind/bodies, and other hybrids. While the concept of "bodyminds" integrates physical and cognitive experiences and challenges dualistic thinking, it has been criticized by scholars for prioritizing Eurocentric notions of the mind and subjectivity over other understandings of bodily normality and difference. Drawing on ten years of ethnographic research in Tanzania, this article argues that the concept of "bodyminds" remains rooted in a Eurocentric framework that overlooks the relational and communal understandings of disability prevalent in Tanzania. We build on Sylvia Wynter's critique of “the figure of Man” to show how dominant disability discourses and practices often overemphasize secular and biological definitions of disability, marginalizing alternative ways of being human. Our ethnographic research highlights the diverse and relational experiences of disability among our Tanzanian interlocutors by thinking with Swahili concepts like mitandao ya jamii (social relationships), utofauti (difference), and kawaida (normality). We conclude by urging scholars to expand frameworks of bodily non-normativity beyond Eurocentric models and toward a more inclusive comprehension of ideas and experiences of normality and difference globally.

Organisation(s)

Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology

Journal

Social Science & Medicine

Pages

118048

ISSN

0277-9536

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2025.118048

Publication date

07-2025

Peer reviewed

Yes

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

509002 Disability studies, 504008 Ethnography

Keywords

Portal url

https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/2cb561fb-313c-49d0-8ea9-3ecee6d480db