"Feminism is weaker when it leaves disability out of the conversation"

In conversation with author Rebekah Taussig

Last year it was as if the book was just calling to me. In the last days of December last year, I was traveling backwards and forwards, Brighton to London, for a myriad of reasons. One of the last things to do to see out 2022 was one last stop to The Feminist Bookshop; the writer Rosemary Ritchings and I had had a Twitter conversation about saying goodbye to the end of projects, particularly books, and how do you send off what feels like your own flesh and blood, and move on? Dramatic? Very. Legitimate? Always. A book is 2.5 years in the making to the moment it sits in your hands.

So. I sat with a new notebook, had my favourite food, and allowed myself to dream of an uncertain future. I came away with Sitting Pretty to read over the Christmas holiday, too.

Dr Rebekah Taussig is something of a multi-hyphenate - a feminist writer, disability advocate, teacher, and just overall a general badass at what she does. She can be found on Instagram under the handle @sittingpretty - which is also the name of her memoir. You can click here to buy it.

For any disabled feminists, this is a must read; it has kept me company through the best of times, the worst of times. So I’m excited to share this interview with the author - and, after all, 1st July is the start of Disability Pride Month. Time to celebrate (!) And if you’d like to support this disabled writer, for disability pride month, please consider signing up to my paywall by clicking this button below.

See you soon x

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For people who may not know, would you mind introducing yourself, who you are and what you do?

Hi! Okay, who am I and what do I do? Does this question send anyone else into existential spirals? Ha! I suppose I would start with this – I find a lot of life to be confusing, contradictory, chaotic, and fascinating. And so I fumble around in the dark until I grab hold of words that feel solid in my hands. I write to understand or feel the ground beneath me. And because I’m a disabled woman (and now parent), a lot of my writing looks out at the world through that lens. I first started sharing my writing publicly on my Instagram account @sitting_pretty. And in 2020, that writing evolved into a book by the same name. Oh, and my name is Rebekah Taussig.

Sitting Pretty is an absolutely brilliant book, one that intermingles disability, feminism and a range of other topics. How did you start writing the book, what was the impetus? 

I’ve been disabled most of my life, but it wasn’t until I was in my late 20s, in graduate school, that I started to think with more curiosity about that experience. It started with a late night read of an academic article by a disability studies scholar. Before that night, I hadn’t known disability studies was a thing. I knew next to nothing about disability history. I wasn’t aware of disability community or culture. That little bit of reading gave me language to understand defining patterns – inside and outside of me – that stretched across my whole life. It was like I’d put on 3D glasses, and I could finally see ableism as a real and living thing winding through my experience in the world. And when I saw that, my world exploded. So I started writing about my personal experiences as a disabled woman. And I decided to share that writing publicly.

Instagram became the container for that. At first I just wrote tiny snippets about things like my growing affection for my scabby, atrophied legs or the feeling of being stared at when I take the three labored steps to put fuel in my car at the gas station. I was amazed that anyone cared to read, and I was amazed by the people I found in that space sharing their own stories with disability. Those people made me feel connected and empowered and curious. So I kept writing, and soon the writing started to evolve into more complex and vulnerable experiences, like the night I went with my partner to his work party and one of his co-workers patted him on the back for dating a woman in a wheelchair. Or the complexity of living in a body with both visible and invisible disabilities. And soon, I started to run out of space. I needed more room to tell longer stories and explore more. It was right around that time that I connected with my literary agent, Laura Lee Mattingly, who helped me imagine what it would be like to turn the writing I’d started on Instagram into a book. 

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Was it something you had wanted/aspired to do? 

I wrote my first book when I was maybe five or six. I remember grabbing stacks of computer paper from my grandparents house and peeling off the perforated edges (I hope there are at least some folks reading this who know what I’m talking about here, haha!), and folding it into a book that I could write and illustrate. In elementary school I carried around a fat notebook where I'd write angsty poems about spider webs and raindrops on windows. In high school and college I wrote slipstream fiction about misfits and outsiders. I devoted all of my time in graduate school to reading and writing. So the short answer is, yes. Writing has always, will always be what I aspire to do. But I didn’t always know it would be this book. 

It’s also notable for the exploration of the intersection between feminism and disability justice. Would you consider yourself to be a feminist? And would you mind if I asked, how and when did that start? 

Yes, I would say I’m a feminist. Although, it does seem like that word can hold various meanings to folks these days. When I say I’m a feminist, I’m speaking from this context: I was raised in a conservative Evangelical community in MidWest America. I was raised to believe that God made men and women to serve different roles – men were the leaders of their homes and wider community, and women cared for children and their husbands. Women were also supposed to dress modestly to keep men from “stumbling” by lusting after them, until they were married, when their job was to keep their husbands sexually gratified. I got married really young within that framework. And it did not go well. I don’t know exactly when I became a feminist, but maybe it was the day I left my husband. I’d lived in a patriarchal system – seen all it had to offer – and rejected it. When I think about feminism, I am picturing one loop on a bigger tapestry that seeks to disrupt/undermine current power structures that seek to control those it deems weaker/less valuable/less acceptable. I’m thinking about alternate ways to care for each other. So, feminism as one part of a greater project. 

And is feminism a concept that needs to be considered in connection with disability and disability justice? If so, why?

Yes, at least in part because many women are or will be disabled, and they add so much to any space they occupy. But also, ableism and patriarchy have always worked in tandem. Arguments to keep women out of public life – education, politics – have roots in assessments of “fitness.” Women’s bodies and minds framed as too “frail” and unpredictable to be trusted. Feminism is weaker when it leaves disability out of the conversation. 

I love particularly that the book speaks with nuance to the need for boundaries sometimes - in that we are so very often expected to be something of an educational resource constantly, and when our existence is politicised, it can feel very personal. How can we implement boundaries, such as when dealing with invasive questions like ‘what happened to you’? 

Ugh, yes, good question. I’m not great at advice – maybe because I don’t have any of this figured out. I fluctuate between avoiding, placating, and lashing out at people, so there’s that. But I extend all the solidarity in the world. This shit is exhausting. Also! There are people who are great at advice, and I love this website Lucy and James Catchpole just put together – essentially, they gathered answers to this “what happened to you” question from a bunch of different disabled folks and made them into actual cards you can hand out to people. Some of the answers are snarky, poignant, educational – something for every mood and preference. I absolutely love that they did this. 

Your book also makes the point at times take ableism is often a learned behaviour - how can we, or people calling themselves allies, learn to unpick that? 

Yes, and part of this learning comes from living in a world that centers nondisabled voices/perspectives and flattens/minimizes/misrepresents disability. I think one of the most important/powerful things an ally can do is read stories/resources by disabled folks. Luckily for all of us, there are so many folks out in the world right now making podcasts and writing books and running TikTok accounts that center on the experience of disability. Just a few people to look up and follow – Emily Ladau, the late Judy Heumann, Keah Brown,  Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Tiffany Hammond, Alice Wong. The more you look/read/listen, the more you’ll find. 

Is there now something of a turning point, in that we see disabled people being represented more, as well as telling their authentic stories? We had the first disability issue of Vogue in the U.K. recently, Christina Applegate and Selma Blair have also done a lot to normalise mobility aides in US media, too. 

This question really brings out the pessimistic optimist in me. In some ways, yes, I think we’re at this exciting turning point that started with self-representation without gatekeepers through social media. I think we’ve been able to gather a lot of power through connecting and creating in that space and beyond. And at the very same time, there’s still so much of the world that doesn’t even sort of understand what this shift is about and would rather go back to a world where disabled people hide in their houses and keep quiet. Both of those things are true, which I suppose simply affirms that it’s important to keep at this. It’s a long game. 

For people wishing to follow in your footsteps, what would be your advice? 

Eeee, are we sure anyone should be following in my footsteps? My path has been a wandering one with a lot of angst and reward, lost loops and moments where the stars aligned. If that sounds like your jam, here are some north stars I’ve followed: say yes to the things that interest you, even if you don’t know where they will lead; don’t be afraid of the aimless stretches; tune into your own compass and try to shake loose any noise coming in from outside frequencies – there are as many ways to do this as there are heartbeats.

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Sitting Pretty is out now.