Disability, identity and media : paralympians in advertising

Abstract

This thesis explores representations of Paralympians within media and advertising. Scholarly research on disability is extremely limited, with current research focusing on print media, and few studies going as far as to perform a discourse analysis. Media representations play a prevalent role in constructing “disability” and have the power to define what it means to be a disabled person. Using a poststructural theoretical framework, I undertake a critical discourse analysis of television advertisements produced by Nike and Visa to uncover what narratives regarding disability are circulating with regularity. I find these advertisements featuring Paralympians serve to reproduce the myth of the “supercrip”, failing to acknowledge the complexity of individual experiences of those living with disabilities. Further, the simultaneous celebration and marginalization of Paralympians, a key dialectic found within these advertisements is indicative of a larger polemics circulating with regularity regarding people with disabilities within our increasingly neoliberal society.