Hello all, I hope everyone enjoyed this week’s reading. Both Bogdan’s and Gerber’s articles discussed the formation of freak shows in the United States and how exhibiting human beings impacted the “freaks” . I would like to focus on the clash between the two articles over the feelings the “freaks” had about their role in these freak shows.
Freak shows experienced their peak years from 1840 to 1940. They often displayed a group of people who had “physical, mental, or behavioral” differences (Bogdan, 23). These shows were not interpreted as offensive until the twentieth century. Freak shows offered an opportunity for employment that (as we saw last week) was not often available for “disabled” people. Bogdan argues the practice of freak shows continued until the “freaks” were seen as “sick”, which made people feel “freaks” belonged less in an exhibit and more in a treatment center.
Bogdan sets up his argument by asking: “What makes a freak?” He not only shows us that freaks can be separated into several classifications. These different groups are “born freaks”, which are people who have been born with something that makes them unusual; “made freaks”, which are people who have done something to themselves to make themselves unusual; and “novelty acts”, which are people who perform unimaginable acts to the public (Bogdan, 24). Also Bogdan uses the example of Jack Earl to show that people could have not been seen as a freak until they were put in an exhibit.
Bogdan also brings up the interesting point of the sense of community formed by the freaks. This community centered on the idea of taking advantage of their customers. Every show was trying to scam those attending the freak shows to increase profit. Performers developed a mindset that looked down upon their audience because the audience fell for the widespread misrepresentations embedded within freak shows.
To increase the audience freak shows often used fabricated stories to make the “freaks” more interesting. Brogdan split these strategies used to increase attendance at freak shows into two different categories: Exotic and Aggrandized. Exotic presentation often posed the “performer” of the freak show as a savage from a far away uncivilized land, which was popular due to the imperial actions being taken by governments in this period (Bogdan, 28-29). Aggrandized status often posed the performer as highly civilized with a very high social standing. Bogdan points out that the perfecting and mixing of these two categories had the goal of achieving the most profit for the freak show.
Bogdon uses the narrative structure and this collection of facts to suggest that due to the economic and deceitful nature behind the exhibition of “freaks,” “freaks” were unaffected by their position as a human exhibition, and being a “‘freak’ was a frame of mind” formed by a “stylized presentation” (Bogdan, 35). He sets this up by first showing that a “freak” wasn’t a specific person, but rather only defined by their performance. Second, freakshow performers only held a belief that they were taking advantage of their spectators because they had fallen for the falseness of their performance. Third and most important, freak shows were created to make money, so the “freaks” chose to be a member of these exhibits so this wasn’t taking away from their humanity because they had chosen to be in these shows.
Gerber’s article critiqued Bogdan by questioning whether or not consent had actually been achievable for “freaks”. Gerber starts by asking whether choice to being oppressed lead to the cessation any moral conundrums that might come with oppression.
Gerber questions whether or not Bogdan really considered the testimonies he used to support his point and give agency back to the disabled. To go about this Gerber first defines what free choice is. He defines this as “a free choice not only when one in uncoerced, but also when one has a significant range of meaningful choices” (Gerber, 42). Then, Gerber goes on to set up how the volition and valorization provide the basis to Bogdan’s argument.
To contradict the valorization of Freak shows, Gerber accepts that some “freaks” could be considered as performers. However, the majority of “freaks” had no sort of performance giving them no sort of legitimacy as a performer. This means that many “freaks” could not have seen themselves as performers due to the fact that all their exhibit consisted of was sitting there while the public gawked at them.
Also to question the volition of the “freaks” and whether or not they had a choice to enter freak shows Gerber takes two approaches. In the first approach, Gerber questions the ability of Bogdon to use these testimonies in order to speak for all of the “freaks”. Gerber brings up many examples of groups who voice are unable to be heard such as Microcephalics and racial minorities. Second, he brings up that many “freaks” were forced to work in freak shows. One example is Otis Jordan who felt that he was unable to support himself in any other way and if he was to not work at the freak it would result with him “being on welfare” (Gerber, 49). This shows that Jordan had no ability to make a free choice in this decision and was forced to work in the freak show. Another reason performers were forced to work in freak shows was that many freakshow entrepreneurs held guardianship over a freak. An example being Charles Stratton who was given to P.T. Barnum at a young age and worked in a freak show. Barnum was the biggest influence on Stratton who became a performer and often wished he had been taken more seriously. Barnum’s guardianship over Stratton shows that Stratton had no free choice and was forced into the life of a human exhibit thanks to Barnum’s influence. These examples directly contradict Bogdon’s arguments on volition and free choice.
Both Bogdon and Gerber question a freak show's ability to be a representation of oppression onto the so called freaks. Both reach different conclusions however, with Bogdon concluding that the underlying economic goal made the “freaks” more performers than human exhibits. Gerber, however, sees freak shows as an oppressive force because of the lack of agency that the “freaks” possessed.
- Were the Freak shows an oppressive force or did they offer an opportunity for economic success and a place of shelter where “freaks” could find a sense of community?
- Did either the Exotic presentation or Aggrandized status offer a less degraded view of the “freaks”?
- How does Dwarfism represent a different culture of disability compared to other “freaks”?
- Was the formation of a “freak” mindset that separated themselves from the public on the basis that they knew about the fraud nature of freak shows lead to a healthy creation of a “freak” culture or further isolate them from society?
- Were “freaks” able to have the capacity for agency in freak shows?
A picture of General Tom Thumb and his wife Lavinia Warren (both in the bottom left)
A carnival talker drawing interest to a freak show using images of an obese woman
Something I think Jack’s post doesn’t address that I would like to draw attention to is the question of why freak shows became popularized at all. An analysis of this popularity will reveal many of the tensions that existed at the time that characterized able-bodied feelings towards the disabled. Gerber illuminates, “But it has also been conceived as evidence of a basic human desire, springing from the intermingling of affection and the will to dominate, to make trained pets of humans, valuing them the more particularly if they are exotic or anomalous and trained to be passive and submissive” (43). Here, Gerber elucidates how the creation of freak shows was a product of the desire to control bodies and render them submissive. This analysis of the psychology of the non-disabled goes back to “our prehumen, animal origins” in a pseudo-psychoanalytic comment (44). Thus, Gerber argues the creation of freak shows underlie basic human desires for control and submission.
ReplyDeleteThis analysis is also one of Gerber’s criticisms of Bogdan, as he argues Bogdan does not pay attention to the “psychology of the audience” (44). One of Gerber’s most persuasive arguments is that the production of freak shows served to distance the able-bodied from the disabled. He writes that freak shows were created “in order to enhance their otherness and exotic qualities” (44). Again, Gerber emphasizes the importance of analyzing the relationship between the audience and the performers when he explains, “To examine the question of valorization is ultimately to ask again why people spent money to gain admittance to freak shows—why, in fact, able-bodied people seem compelled to stare at those with physical disabilities” (45).
One of Gerber’s other criticisms of Bogdan is the fact that “Bogdan generally assumes the willingness of people to be human exhibits” (45). Gerber continues by explaining how this assumption might have been true for some of the performers, those performers were in the minority and Bogdan’s analysis is thus insufficient to explain the relations that existed. However, some of Bogdan’s essay supplements Gerber’s arguments about attempting to create a greater divide between the disabled and the non-disabled. Bogdan writes how “every person exhibited was misrepresented…to produce a more appealing freak” (25). This misrepresentation proves that freak shows served to make disability more exotic and thus maintain the integrity and coherence of the non-disabled. Thus, freak shows recreated and made more distinct the binary between the “normal” and the “freaks.”
Hello all. Jack Scaif’s blog post mentioned several important themes regarding the ethical dilemmas within freak shows. Especially in the Gerber article, the issue of consent to be exploited comes into account. As I was reading this article, I was reminded of the ethical framework of libertarianism. Thus, I believe that applying a libertarian lens to this situation may yield valuable insight.
ReplyDeleteFirst, the issue of consent from the “freaks” poses a dilemma. On one hand, the “freak” enters into a business deal with the circus. This fulfills a libertarian’s criteria for fairness—a contract signed by both parties. This consent may be seen in the case of Otis “the frogman” Jordan. Jordan, even though mocked at for his deformity, was content to be a “freak” (48-49). In this case, the consent is apparent due to the positive outcome for Jordan. “’How can she say I’m being taken advantage of? Hell, what does she want from me—to be on welfare?’” says Jordan in reference to his occupation (49). Using this example, one can see that the libertarian value of the contract benefits Jordan and the circus.
However, often subject to criticism, libertarian values do not always coincide with a supposedly “right choice.” As Gerber outlines in his description of consent “free choice… is uncoerced, … [and] also [occurs] when one has a significant range of meaningful choices” (42). Many “freaks” did not have free choice because their only options were signing with the circus, or becoming a welfare recipient. Here, the libertarian value does not reconcile with coerced choices. One is not truly free enough to make a meaningful choice unless he/she has multiple, meaningful options. Thus, when considering the implications of libertarian values on the “freak show,” one has to first determine what a free choice is.
When confronted with unemployment and poverty, many people will choose a life of humiliation—as long as it puts bread on the table. In examining the rationale behind one’s choice to become a “freak,” we now can see that extenuating circumstances, more often than not, actually forced deformed and disabled people to become professional freaks.
To begin, I would like to focus on Jaden’s response to why freak shows became popular during this time period. He talks about how humans have a profound interest in association between animals and humans. This brings me to my argument about how Charles Darwin’s evolution theory contributed heavily to the growth of freak show. As Jaden showed, humans were heavily interested in the human evolution from the animal state to the human state, yet while many could hypothesize or speculate about the image of the evolutional chain of being, few could solidify a concrete image of the “in-between” stage of animal and human. Freak shows solved that problem by claiming to find the “missing link” in social evolution (Bogdan 29); for example, they staged Julia Pastrana, a hairy, oversized women, as this “missing link” in evolution between man and “beast,” which in turn attracted people to want to see her on display. Therefore, society’s continued desire with human progress contributed to the success of displaying “exotic,” “less evolved”, and disabled people in America.
ReplyDeleteNext I would like to discuss Jack’s initial question regarding economic standings of “freaks.” He poses the question asking whether or not freak shows were oppressive or offered an opportunity economically for disable people. While I agree with the argument Gerber makes regarding Bogdan’s idea of choice and desire, I cannot fully support his claim that freak shows were harmful to the well being of the disabled. I agree that the “freaks” were coerced into a terrible situation where they could either choose poverty or public display “as [a] morally uplifting and educational, not merely as frivolous amusement” (Bogdan 27); however, I would argue that, regardless, freak shows did elevate the status of disabled people. Regardless of the situation, disable people have always been stigmatized and forced into a role of poverty (Gerber 47), for they were not given the same occupational opportunities as the able bodied were present with, which we discussed last week. Therefore, while freak shows continued the stigmatization of disabled people on a public scale, at least the “freaks” could make an economic profit and began enjoying their life (Gerber 48). We can look to the example of Jordan the “the frog,” where he was stuck in poverty until he got a job in the freak show. He earned enough money to buy a house a start a decent life; he even claimed that his life after the freak show was substantially better than before (49). Therefore, we can infer that while disabled people have always been marginalized, with freak shows at least they improved their lives.
While Jack discusses in detail the ways in which the two articles disagree and how Gerber neutralizes many of his counterpart’s points, I think it is important to note some of the insightful points Bogdan presents especially in regard to the ironies that the Freak Show embodied.
ReplyDeleteTo be sure, Gerber’s analysis of Bogdan’s own evidence in an alternate way discredits claims regrading the agency and volition of the disabled people in the circus, calling into question a significant part of Bogdan’s argument (Gerber 48, 50-51). However, Bogdan’s article offers particular insight not necessarily in his analysis of disabled people themselves but in the evidence he provides about tactics to draw in the normal bodied.
Bogdan comments that in their attempts to garner attention, show people presented their spectacle as “recommended by or associated with prestigious people…scientists, doctors, clergy, newspapers” and as “morally uplifting and educational, not merely as frivolous amusement” (27). However, in his discussion of the exotic presentation, Bogdan notes that these acts were intended to “appeal to people’s interest in the culturally strange, the primitive, the bestial, the exotic” and presented “exaggerated stereotypic [models] of the mannerisms and customs of its supposed country of origin” (28).While shows aimed to draw in new customers by presenting themselves as educational and novel, the use of stereotypical representations to construct exhibits actually affirms widely held beliefs regarding the cultures depicted instead of providing new information and differing cultural perspectives. Considering the centrality Bogdan gives to the exotic presentation and his assertion of the success of freak shows as a whole, one must ask why a population drawn to a display specifically for its proclamations of uniqueness would be satisfied by exhibits that simply uphold stereotypes and expectations (28-29). Perhaps, this contradiction comes from society’s need to have generalizations and interpretations upheld or from a desire to have the other standardized more fully. Regardless, the contradiction created by initial assertions of distinctiveness preceding presentations of cliched spectacles asserts the fickle nature of society’s interpretation of the other, where truth may exist in a subordinate position to confirmation of convention.
The readings this week highlight the complexity and lack of a satisfying answer to Jack’s first question about the positive potential of the concept of “freaks.” Bogdan’s emphasis on the social construction of “freaks” reveals the process of misrepresentation and distortion of disabled individuals in order to turn difference into an appealing commodity (25). The distortion of perception of disability would seem, as Jack hints, a double-edged sword in which one can both escape from traditional conceptions of disability as inferior yet can also find themselves commodified as their disability turns into a spectacle. As Kyle points out, Bogdan uses the historical setting to demonstrate the appeal of the exotic model of disability in the midst of “world exploration and Western expansion” along with discussions of Darwinism and eugenics (28-29). Bogdan juxtaposes this framework with the aggrandized status, which holds the potential for viewing difference as superior, though it still is founded upon an abled-bodied conception of objectification. Yet, Bogdan warns against viewing the models as incompatible, for the imagery promoting these shows contains extreme complexities and variances.
ReplyDeleteBogdan highlights how interest in science results in a fascination towards strangeness, yet Gerber goes further and emphasizes the role of age, class, race, and gender in displays of disability. Gerber shows how the perception of free choice reflects “Western discourse” that does not offer a true choice to those subordinated by their social status (28). Gerber further calls out Bogdan’s narrow conception about the cause of the decline of the popularity of freak shows. Gerber says that Bogdan fails to entertain the possibility of “moral rejection” of the freak show as an effective way to counter its dehumanizing prospects (45).
One must make a note of our modern assumptions when evaluating the potential for agency generation in freak shows. Gerber admits the difficulty in viewing the exhibits from “anything but a moral standpoint” which appears exclusively founded upon “vulgarity and exploitation” (43). Some seemed to adopt freak shows, however, as a form of “solidarity and cynical insularity” with the desire to enact revenge on an often stigmatizing world by using their different to take money (52). Though Gerber criticizes many of Bogdan’s assumptions, both authors agree on the existence of many complexities surrounding the role of consent and agency in freak shows.
The second question "Did either the Exotic presentation or Aggrandized status offer a less degraded view of the “freaks”?" is quite intriguing.
ReplyDeleteThe first thing to establish is Bogdan's motives in clearly delineating the methods with which the "freaks" were presented. The first mode of presentation is the exotic. This mode tended to emphasize a few things as detailed by Bogan on page twenty-eight:
1. They exhibited people that supposedly came from a foreign part of the globe, often one that was not what Americans and Europeans in the 1800s would consider developed.
2. The people in the exhibits often wore simple costumes and were expected to behave in a "savage" manner.
3. The exhibits often emphasized people with physical deformities or conditions such as albinism and a constant motif of imperial exploration.
4. The exhibits often utilized faux science to convince spectators of the legitimacy of the exotic "freaks" within the show.
The second mode of presenting people with disabilities is detailed by Bogdan on page twenty-nine and thirty. The aggrandized mode tended to emphasize several characteristics that are in direct opposition to what the exotic mode emphasized.
1. The aggrandized mode placed most of its focus on the unique background and family of the subject.
2. These people were considered worth seeing for their unique talents, such as, titles, fabricated political positions, musical talents, and people who were able to do something the public considered impossible in context to the abilities of the public and the assumed constraints of a disability.
3. The exhibits utilized themes of glamor and luxury to emphasize the above normal capabilities of the person within the exhibit.
Now that these basic definitions have been established I think it is fair to argue that the exotic mode of presenting disability was more obviously degrading. These exhibits not only focused but relied on an assumed physical or racial inferiority that made their existence something that could be examined and classified in a scientific manner. It is also important to consider that the exotic mode relied on scientific justifications in the way they exhibited the people in the show. The sort of things the exhibits were concerned with were abnormalities and conventionally socially unacceptable practices, Bogdan cites "cannibalism, human sacrifice, head hunting, polygamy" and other things that would have intrigued and yet repelled the average onlooker. In the most basic sense I think the exotic mode represents a more classic understanding of what a "freakshow" meant (29). These people were exhibited for their abnormalities which unlike the aggrandized mode were not celebrated but mocked. They were presented as dangerous and savage oddities.
Inline image 1 (The image will not show up so I'm just going to have to trust all of you to click on the link if you are interested)
(Wikimedia, Digital Commons)
This image depicts the "Wild Brothers From Borneo" and exemplifies the exotic way of showcasing "freaks." The brothers were depicted as two strange and wild men from Borneo capable of extreme feats off strength.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_Men_of_Borneo
The aggrandized mode, however, seems to represent "freaks" in a much less degrading way. It emphasizes how the talents or physical deformities the "freaks" are presented with do not have implications on their ability to live a "normal" life. While it would be wrong to romanticize the aggrandized way that the "freaks" were presented because its sole purpose was to commodify disability in order to show "freaks" to the masses for cheap entertainment.
ReplyDeleteThe last point I want to make is that the exotic way of representing "freaks" and the aggrandized mode might sometimes happen at the same time. I think this speaks to the fact that even when the people in the show were being shown as capable of intense intelligence or strength that it was still possible to at the same time degrade those people for their alterity.
I am compelled with Jack's final question about whether or not freaks possessed agency within the freak show. I think Gerber's attacks on Bogdan's construction of freak agency possess several worth points. However, I think Gerber's analysis fails to account for the situation that may disabled individuals faced.
ReplyDeleteAs many of my peers and Gerber both note, disabled individuals "historically existed in society under conditions of ostracism and stigmatization, and have had to endure the oppression of unwanted attention" (Gerber 47-48). Much of Gerber's analysis centers around the idea of consent and choices. Gerber rightfully points out that consent requires that one have choices to make (42). Clearly, disabled individuals did not possess the ability to make a choice about their future. However, I believe that this point does not undercut the notion that freaks had agency. Instead, I believe that this only further reifies the notion of the social model of disability.
In the context of Otis Jordan, Gerber claims that before entering the freak show business, Jordan "had spent nearly three decades attempting, with poor results, to support himself" (48). This statement connects back to last week's discussion regarding disability and labor. The labor industry and work itself are both inherently opposed to the disabled individual because they center around the notion of an able-bodied individual conducting the work. Thus, society has limited the choices of individuals like Jordan to "participating in a freak show or 'being on welfare,'" so "it really does not appear that he has had much choice at all" (49). For disabled people, they had to make a decision between living in poverty versus having a stable income and sense of security in terms of shelter and labor. Thus, Gerber's claims only serve to demonstrate the limited options of disabled individuals, but do not disprove the idea that freak's had agency.
Gerber understates that importance of the choice that disabled people made, regardless of whether or not that was a decision amongst many possible choices. While discussing Jordan's predicament, Gerber claims: "Perhaps all we can say of his participation in the freak show is that he has made the best of a bad situation, while noting, too, that the cause of Jordan's dignity would be better served if our social arrangements allowed him to ear a decent livelihood from mainstream employment" (49). Gerber understates the importance of Jordan's decision. Rather than confine himself to the subordinate, economically dependent role that society has placed him in, Jordan sought a way to break out of those confines. Despite only having two options, Jordan made the conscious decision to participate in the freak show. In doing so, Jordan chose to have an income, stable shelter, secure labor, and an overall sense of self-assuredness. Therefore, his actions necessarily demonstrate the agency that he possessed. The later half of Gerber's statement further proves the point I made above; societal constructions limited his choices, but Jordan's actions demonstrated agency within these limited choices.
Gerber understates the importance of the decision, albeit limited, that disabled individuals made to enter the freak show. By consenting to participate in the freak shows, disabled individuals such as Otis Jordan demonstrated their ability to dictate their future and develop a life path that guaranteed stability in income and security for themselves.
After the discussion in class today, I was really interested in the questions over agency in our reading of history.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of our discussion, Mr. Kogan posed the "pendulum question:” in interpreting history, do we need re-readings that are overly optimistic in assigning agency in order to challenge current perspectives?
Gerber certainly does a good job explaining that he is not fully refuting Bogdan’s work, but rather simply questioning (what Gerber interprets as) Bogdan’s overdone focus on agency. As Jaden explained in class based off of a good deal of evidence on page 39 of the Gerber article, Gerber’s point is that we can see the freak show as a way to get agency while still acknowledging the inequality at the time.
The danger in letting that pendulum swing too far to the side of optimism is that the re-reading then whitewashes over social hierarchies. As Gerber explains in the case of Otis “the Frogman” Jordan, focusing on the choice to participate in freak shows erases the critique that “Jordan’s dignity would be better served if our social arrangements allowed him to earn a decent livelihood from mainstream employment” (49). Likewise, Gerber’s example of “dwarfs” indicates that earning a living isn’t necessarily key to have equality: despite getting jobs that were highly visible in acting, they were “infantilized, patronized, stared at, mocked, and lacking significant power over much of their lives” (50). Here Gerber’s reading becomes critical: while Bogdan’s chapter argues that agency was certainly claimed through the freak shows, Gerber connects agency to larger societal structures. Obviously agency does not come from external structures, yet Gerber’s argument points out that broader societal structures certainly limit how people may act in the world and restrict forms of agency. Thus the idea of optimism runs the danger of not having a harsh enough critique of social inequalities that must be acknowledged in reading disability history.
However, while Bogdan may be guilty of this overdetermination of agency, I would like to quickly point out that he still attacks social structures. He notes that the emergence of the medical model of interpretation was problematic because “pity did not coincide with the world of amusement” (34). As many noted in class, the transition to the medical model fostered stigmatization. Thus it would be prudent not to oversimplify Bogdan’s argument to simply “freak shows are proof of agency."
In the broader sense of not letting the pendulum "swinging too far towards optimism,” I think the best answer may lay in a plethora of scholarship. Assigning agency and fighting social inequalities are both critical to the re-reading of history, and while any re-reading of history should keep both in mind, the sheer number of articles and analyses may serve as the best way we can achieve a proper interrogative yet supportive historical approach.
On an unrelated note, but in response to Jack’s second question in the lead post, I noticed an example of intersectionality in the discussion over ideas of the “exotic.” As we mentioned in class, the popularity of freak shows occurred during times of imperialism. Bogdan points out that “skin color became an important factor” due to the racial hierarchies and ideas of difference of the era (32). Likewise, a white person could only be exotic if they were marked as having lived "among non-Western people” (32). This intersection of race in disability history is brief in Bogdan’s article, yet as we mentioned all the way back in week one, a re-reading of history is not complete without interrogating how different constructions of inequality interact with one another (and, to offer food for thought, perhaps this recognition highlights a deficiency in the Gerber article).
Thanks for reading
- Will
Following our discussion on freak shows I want to address some of the important ideas that arose about agency and oppression. Firstly, I think it is important to reiterate the point that our modern perception and classification of freak shows as immoral profoundly influences our understanding of freak shows and disabled people within them. Our modern perception of freak shows and the information we learned last week about the difficulty disabled people faced to get jobs lends us to more likely agree with Gerber. Another point regarding agency vs. oppression that did not come up in class is the question of the nature of different “Freak’s” disabilities. Disabled people in freak shows had “’physical, mental, or behavioral’” differences (Bogdan, 23). One question we did not get the chance to discuss is the question of whether or not there was a trend between agency or oppression within theses groups of disability. For example, was it more oppressive for people who were physically disabled than behaviorally disabled? Would a freak show more likely be a form of agency for a person who can walk on their hands or for someone with down syndrome? These are questions we unfortunately did not get to discuss in class; however, I believe this was probably true. A person who is “obviously” disabled, either physically or mentally, was much less likely to receive a job than an able-bodied person. Since many Freaks performed by walking on their hands or doing another crazy trick, their “disability” could not be seen. Finally, I want to address the controversy over the binary between Gerber and Bogdan. Although the two articles on the surface appear to be in contradiction with each other, they do not have to be. The question of the type of disability perfectly explains this idea: freak shows do not need to be defined as totally giving agency or totally oppressive. Bogdan’s and Gerber’s ideas work more efficiently in the discussion of Freaks when they’re used in collaboration with each other. The discussion today was very interesting in challenging the perceived binaries of disability, and I believe addressing the different types of disability would have allowed us to further expand our conversation.
ReplyDeleteFor this blog post I wanted to focus on our discussion of agency as well as Gerber’s theories regarding consent and disabled populations. As I expressed during the discussion, I find Gerber’s argument regarding the consent to participate in freak problematic as it denies agency to disabled people. Shown with our discussion of Jordan, “the Frogman,” we see an instance of a person who willingly participated in freak shows and embraced this life choice. Gerber cites that “according to Jordan himself, ‘It was the best thing that ever happened to him. He likes to travel and meet people and his new profession enabled him to buy a small house” and further that “there wasn’t anybody forcing him to do it’” (49-50). Gerber attempts to criticize Bogdan’s argument and says that Jordan’s “participation in the freak show world is … the best of a bad situation” (49). Gerber’s analysis denies Jordan agency by arguing that Jordan did not have any other choices in his life and instead had his choices almost entirely constricted by his society. The conception that a consensual choice must be a choice between all options is extremely problematic in this instance because Gerber over simplifies Jordan’s life and argues that he only had two ways to live his life: on welfare or in a freak show. Although we do not have all the facts, it appears likely that Jordan would have had some other way to live his life. This simplistic approach to history inevitably denies some sort of agency by reducing Jordan’s career choice to a coerced action as opposed to a conscious and self-determined choice.
ReplyDeleteBogdan alternatively examines the popularity of freak shows and generally does not question why people participated in the shows. Citing instances of scientific appeals such as using “the word ‘museum’ in the title of many freak shows and refer[ing] to freak show lecturers as ‘professor’ or ‘doctor’” (29), Bogdan notes the educational justifications for freak shows. While the shows were primarily a form of entertainment, they were further justified as educational scenarios.
This justification for freak shows led to “the manufacture and management of disability images for profit” (34). Bogdan aptly notes the commodification of disability and how it was used to generate profit by inciting pity and reinforcing notions of the medical model of disability. Freak shows were thus popular both due to being entertaining as well as educational, the perfect combination for a performance to make large amounts of money.
Bogdan both discusses the societal justifications for freak shows as well as avoids falling into the trap of over determining the choices of the people who participated in these shows. He notes, “persons with anomalies found refuge in a world where there were others similarly situated” and that “they found acceptance and more freedom than either custodial institutions or the mainstream might provide” (35). Noting that the freak shows were almost always better than other options, Bogdan legitimately justifies the choice that many people made to join freak shows where as Gerber simply says that they joined the freak shows because they did not have other options. While these two ideas may sound synonymous, there is an important distinction in that Bogdan proves that there was a conscious choice to join freak shows where as Gerber simply says people joined because society forced them to join.