It’s (Not) a Big Deal: Performing 'Normality' and 'Disability' in the Context of Chronic Pain

• In Event: Rejecting/Perfecting/Performing (Ab)Normal Bodies: Bridging Disparate Modes of Being

Abstract

Over 50 million Americans are currently believed to be living with chronic pain. Though chronic pain affects a significant portion of the US population, it is still considered to be an “abnormal” and imperfect condition. Simultaneously, the pain itself is subject to value judgments based on assumed degree of severity (often related to what is believed to be the precipitating condition), and the demographic position (including socio-economics, race, sex, education level, and age) of the individual. Ultimately, however, the overriding social call is for the individual with chronic pain to behave “normally” in the ultimate goal of body perfection. Yet this performance of normal must be accomplished in the context of the lived experience of a body resistant to a pain-free norm. These conflicting needs create cultural dialectics of revelation/concealment and success/failure in the management of pain, pain symptoms, and pain treatment, leading to a complex performative space for the chronic pain “sufferer.” In this work, I consider our cultural understandings of chronic pain, drawing upon examples from medical and public discourse, as well as discussing the options available for social performance of the pained body.

Author

• Lorin Basden Arnold, Rowan University