A Glossary
Some terms
Mitigation of Care
A mitigation of care is an action, process, notion, or practice of care that is carried out within a system where care is not the prime motivator or highest priority. This means that the system within which the mitigation takes place is not designed for care to take place. The system may therefore be very conducive to care, very hostile to care, or anything in between. It will only ever be a coincidence as the system has not been designed with care in mind, or with care as a decisive priority. Most of the systems we function within do not have care as their motivating priority. Education systems prioritise, for example, exam outputs or school discipline over care. Employment systems prioritise, for example, making profits, keeping a business open and running, or moving towards an economic strategy over care. A mitigation of care is always vulnerable to being ‘gazumped’ by one or more of the motivating priorities in the system, and where care can be applied, it must usually be applied ‘in the cracks’ either where there is slack in the system or where the system does not notice. In these systems, care is often conceived of as a luxury, or a benefit, or a perk, or an added extra and is therefore vulnerable to deletion of restriction whenever the motivating priorities of the system become pressed — during budget cuts, for example, or when a child is forced to take an exam. Mitigations of care will also be subject to negotiation in that the person proposing the care can expect to be negotiated down to a position that is more compatible with the functioning of the system itself. An example, person A needs flexible working hours. OK, but there must be core working hours and they have to do a certain number of hours per day or week and they must attend core meetings etc.
System of Care
A system of care is very simply one which has the care of its people as its prime motivating priority. This means that the care will be considered first in terms of both importance and also chronologically. A system of care does not have to be a system which only provides care, but it is one that will provide care as its baseline and all other priorities are mutable against this first priority. Note that many institutions and organisations that one might expect to be systems of care are not, and in fact offer care as a mitigation. This can be seen, for example, in the privatisation of healthcare where cost considerations are paramount, or in an education establishment where performance in a league table or exam is more important than the care of the learner. Privatisation has seen many systems of care move to mitigations of care.
Floodlight Accessibility
This comes from a metaphor of a football pitch that is floodlit from one end. So one end of the pitch is in full light, while the far end is in darkness. Accessibility in this metaphor is seen as lighting more and more of the pitch, either from the end that is already lit, or from the end that is in darkness. In practical terms, floodlight accessibility will focus on making an environment or experience accessible to disabled people as though they were not disabled. That is, the aim (perhaps an impossible one) is that the disability or not of the participant or attendee is rendered irrelevant. Put another way, the aim is that disabled people can attend and participate in such a way that their experience is identical (or as close as possible) to the experience of an able bodied & (see below) person. In this approach, disabilities can be seen as creating gaps in the experience which are then filled, for example, a deaf person cannot hear what is being said, so a sign language interpreter is provided to replace the experience of hearing. A person in a wheelchair can go everywhere that a person not in a wheelchair can go. A blind or partially sighted person has what is visible described to them through audio description. A neurodiverse person is made as comfortable as possible to experience the show with reduced anxiety, etc. In this model, the experience itself might remain unchanged and the accessibility is a practical consideration around the central experience. In some instances, the needs of accessibility might infiltrate the stage area, such as with surtitles incorporated into the scenography, or the sign interpreter taking on a role. In any case, in the extreme version of this model, the experience the able bodied & person has is the yardstick by which all experiences are measured and the aim is that as far as possible, all participants experience ‘the same thing’. The able bodied & experience and participants remain, therefore, centred and the disabled person remains peripheral, albeit ‘floodlit’ and not left in the dark.
Able Bodied &
The term disabled is much broader in its application than its opposite of ‘able bodied’. The addition of the ‘&’ recognises this imbalance in the terminology, taking in terms such as neuro-typical, sighted, hearing, etc.
Lantern Theory
Lantern theory stands in contrast to Floodlight Accessibility. In this metaphor, accessibility is seen as a lantern that can be placed anywhere with the notional experience space, in contrast to the floodlighting of the experience space. This means that accessibility provision is particular to a particular need, can be multiple and different, and creates a different experience for those who are in need of it or in proximity to it. In this model, the recreation of the able bodied & experience of the event for all participants is not necessarily a goal. Instead, various experiences are possible. This also means that a disabled person can experience the event in a disabled way and the monolithic centring of able bodied & experience is broken down. For example, a partially sighted or blind person may experience the event as they experience the world, rather than the ‘gap’ of their disability being filled with audio description, or a deaf or hearing impaired person might enter a different space where the story is told in a different way. Wheelchair users might follow a different experience path that means that an outdoor part of a performance is replaced with a workshop. It can go further than this too in that there is no central experience that is ‘interpreted out’ for disabled people and the lanterns in the dark space make up the work itself rather than being versions of it. In this model, it may also be that there is no desire to make the event accessible to everyone as this is not the priority. So a piece may be lantern lit only for blind and partially sighted people (poor metaphor here) or just for ND people.
Fluid Accessibility
Fluid accessibility is an approach whereby the needs of the participant are not anticipated according to a fixed set of rules and expectations, but rather confronted in the moment. Fluid accessibility requires a learning environment that has responded and changed in accordance with previous accessibility requirements, of course, or the wheel will need to be constantly reinvented and the practical requirements for accessibility will not be realistically met. A simple example here is a wheelchair ramp. To have to fluidly build a ramp each time someone in a wheelchair needs access to the building is ridiculous.
Lever Arch File Accessibility
This is where accessibility is envisioned and, to a greater or lesser degree, enacted as a procedure. An organisation might go through an accessibility consultation process where accessibility in their context is analysed and formulated. This formula is then written down and printed up and stored in a file on a shelf. When someone with accessibility needs then comes into contact with the organisation, someone can pull down the file, go through the contents and find the right page which tells them ‘what to do’. This is an approach that creates a broader set of norms that take in disabled experiences in a fossilised and formulaic way. Accessibility in this way is usually seen as an exterior expertise and the organisation ‘does its best’ in a tick box exercise. There will often be one person responsible for accessibility in the organisation in an ‘officer’ capacity.
Pervasive Accessibility
Where accessibility becomes everyone’s job and the concern of all within an organisation and an MO through which all procedures and tasks are approached. In this instance, accessibility is not seen as a side / extra / under / luxury process, but rather takes place over the course of things.
Poetics of Accessibility
Viewing accessibility as the struggle to communicate and understand while admitting that perfection or even ‘good enough’ is probably impossible. Like a poet has to use words that are inadequate to make something brand new and unique, so in accessibility we have to struggle each time to make new and unique ways to be kind.
A mitigation of care is an action, process, notion, or practice of care that is carried out within a system where care is not the prime motivator or highest priority. This means that the system within which the mitigation takes place is not designed for care to take place. The system may therefore be very conducive to care, very hostile to care, or anything in between. It will only ever be a coincidence as the system has not been designed with care in mind, or with care as a decisive priority. Most of the systems we function within do not have care as their motivating priority. Education systems prioritise, for example, exam outputs or school discipline over care. Employment systems prioritise, for example, making profits, keeping a business open and running, or moving towards an economic strategy over care. A mitigation of care is always vulnerable to being ‘gazumped’ by one or more of the motivating priorities in the system, and where care can be applied, it must usually be applied ‘in the cracks’ either where there is slack in the system or where the system does not notice. In these systems, care is often conceived of as a luxury, or a benefit, or a perk, or an added extra and is therefore vulnerable to deletion of restriction whenever the motivating priorities of the system become pressed — during budget cuts, for example, or when a child is forced to take an exam. Mitigations of care will also be subject to negotiation in that the person proposing the care can expect to be negotiated down to a position that is more compatible with the functioning of the system itself. An example, person A needs flexible working hours. OK, but there must be core working hours and they have to do a certain number of hours per day or week and they must attend core meetings etc.
System of Care
A system of care is very simply one which has the care of its people as its prime motivating priority. This means that the care will be considered first in terms of both importance and also chronologically. A system of care does not have to be a system which only provides care, but it is one that will provide care as its baseline and all other priorities are mutable against this first priority. Note that many institutions and organisations that one might expect to be systems of care are not, and in fact offer care as a mitigation. This can be seen, for example, in the privatisation of healthcare where cost considerations are paramount, or in an education establishment where performance in a league table or exam is more important than the care of the learner. Privatisation has seen many systems of care move to mitigations of care.
Floodlight Accessibility
This comes from a metaphor of a football pitch that is floodlit from one end. So one end of the pitch is in full light, while the far end is in darkness. Accessibility in this metaphor is seen as lighting more and more of the pitch, either from the end that is already lit, or from the end that is in darkness. In practical terms, floodlight accessibility will focus on making an environment or experience accessible to disabled people as though they were not disabled. That is, the aim (perhaps an impossible one) is that the disability or not of the participant or attendee is rendered irrelevant. Put another way, the aim is that disabled people can attend and participate in such a way that their experience is identical (or as close as possible) to the experience of an able bodied & (see below) person. In this approach, disabilities can be seen as creating gaps in the experience which are then filled, for example, a deaf person cannot hear what is being said, so a sign language interpreter is provided to replace the experience of hearing. A person in a wheelchair can go everywhere that a person not in a wheelchair can go. A blind or partially sighted person has what is visible described to them through audio description. A neurodiverse person is made as comfortable as possible to experience the show with reduced anxiety, etc. In this model, the experience itself might remain unchanged and the accessibility is a practical consideration around the central experience. In some instances, the needs of accessibility might infiltrate the stage area, such as with surtitles incorporated into the scenography, or the sign interpreter taking on a role. In any case, in the extreme version of this model, the experience the able bodied & person has is the yardstick by which all experiences are measured and the aim is that as far as possible, all participants experience ‘the same thing’. The able bodied & experience and participants remain, therefore, centred and the disabled person remains peripheral, albeit ‘floodlit’ and not left in the dark.
Able Bodied &
The term disabled is much broader in its application than its opposite of ‘able bodied’. The addition of the ‘&’ recognises this imbalance in the terminology, taking in terms such as neuro-typical, sighted, hearing, etc.
Lantern Theory
Lantern theory stands in contrast to Floodlight Accessibility. In this metaphor, accessibility is seen as a lantern that can be placed anywhere with the notional experience space, in contrast to the floodlighting of the experience space. This means that accessibility provision is particular to a particular need, can be multiple and different, and creates a different experience for those who are in need of it or in proximity to it. In this model, the recreation of the able bodied & experience of the event for all participants is not necessarily a goal. Instead, various experiences are possible. This also means that a disabled person can experience the event in a disabled way and the monolithic centring of able bodied & experience is broken down. For example, a partially sighted or blind person may experience the event as they experience the world, rather than the ‘gap’ of their disability being filled with audio description, or a deaf or hearing impaired person might enter a different space where the story is told in a different way. Wheelchair users might follow a different experience path that means that an outdoor part of a performance is replaced with a workshop. It can go further than this too in that there is no central experience that is ‘interpreted out’ for disabled people and the lanterns in the dark space make up the work itself rather than being versions of it. In this model, it may also be that there is no desire to make the event accessible to everyone as this is not the priority. So a piece may be lantern lit only for blind and partially sighted people (poor metaphor here) or just for ND people.
Fluid Accessibility
Fluid accessibility is an approach whereby the needs of the participant are not anticipated according to a fixed set of rules and expectations, but rather confronted in the moment. Fluid accessibility requires a learning environment that has responded and changed in accordance with previous accessibility requirements, of course, or the wheel will need to be constantly reinvented and the practical requirements for accessibility will not be realistically met. A simple example here is a wheelchair ramp. To have to fluidly build a ramp each time someone in a wheelchair needs access to the building is ridiculous.
Lever Arch File Accessibility
This is where accessibility is envisioned and, to a greater or lesser degree, enacted as a procedure. An organisation might go through an accessibility consultation process where accessibility in their context is analysed and formulated. This formula is then written down and printed up and stored in a file on a shelf. When someone with accessibility needs then comes into contact with the organisation, someone can pull down the file, go through the contents and find the right page which tells them ‘what to do’. This is an approach that creates a broader set of norms that take in disabled experiences in a fossilised and formulaic way. Accessibility in this way is usually seen as an exterior expertise and the organisation ‘does its best’ in a tick box exercise. There will often be one person responsible for accessibility in the organisation in an ‘officer’ capacity.
Pervasive Accessibility
Where accessibility becomes everyone’s job and the concern of all within an organisation and an MO through which all procedures and tasks are approached. In this instance, accessibility is not seen as a side / extra / under / luxury process, but rather takes place over the course of things.
Poetics of Accessibility
Viewing accessibility as the struggle to communicate and understand while admitting that perfection or even ‘good enough’ is probably impossible. Like a poet has to use words that are inadequate to make something brand new and unique, so in accessibility we have to struggle each time to make new and unique ways to be kind.