thebibliosphere Whgskl. Okay. PSA to all you fantasy writers because I have just had a truly frustrating twenty minutes talking to someone about this: it’s okay to put mobility aids in your novel and have them just be ordinary. Like. Super okay. I don’t give a sh*t if it’s high fantasy, low fantasy or somewhere between the lovechild of Tolkein meets My Immortal. It’s okay to use mobility devices in your narrative. It’s okay to use the word “wheelchair”. You don’t have to remake the f*cking wheel. It’s already been done for you. And no, it doesn’t detract from the “realism” of your fictional universe in which you get to set the standard for realism. Please don’t try to use that as a reason for not using these things. There is no reason to lock the disabled people in your narrative into towers because “that’s the way it was”, least of all in your novel about dragons and mermaids and other made up creatures. There is no historical realism here. You are in charge. You get to decide what that means. Also: “Depiction of Chinese philosopher Confucius in a wheelchair, dating to ca. 1680. The artist may have been thinking of methods of transport common in his own day.” “But Joy, how do I describe this contraption in a fantasy setting that wont make it seem out of place?” “It was a chair on wheels, which Prince FancyPants McElferson propelled forwards using his arms to direct the motion of the chair.” “It was a chair on wheels, which Prince EvenFancierPants McElferson used to get about, pushed along by one of his companions or one of his many attending servants.” “But it’s a high realm magical fantas—” “It was a floating chair, the hum of magical energy keeping it off the ground casting a faint glow against the cobblestones as {CHARACTER} guided it round with expert ease, gliding back and forth.” “But it’s a stempunk nov—” “Unlike other wheelchairs he’d seen before, this one appeared to be self propelling, powered by the gasket of steam at the back, and directed by the use of a rudder like toggle in the front.” Give. Disabled. Characters. In. Fantasy. Novels. Mobility. Aids. If you can spend 60 pages telling me the history of your world in innate detail down to the formation of how magical rocks were formed, you can god damn write three lines in passing about a wheelchair. Signed, your editor who doesn’t have time for this ableist fantasy realm sh*t. Some options for other disabilities and aids: “Jack had an unusual pair of sticks, unlike anything Jill had seen before; they were much like canes, but rather than ending in a knot or handle they continued up into a pair of bracelets, held together round his wrists by a cunning slide mechanism. They kept him, she noted, quite sure of foot even on the steep ground.” (wrist braces; cerebral palsy) “Fandir wore a ring around her ear. It looked something like a fancy collar, its edges tipped outward as though forming a funnel, and when she was spoken to she turned it in the direction of the speaker.” (hearing aid, based off antique “hearing trumpets”) “Victor’s left arm was a marvel of the modern age–held together with a thousand miniscule steel plates and ten thousand tiny gears, wearing a small brazier, much like a jacket cuff, to fire the steam that moved its mechanical fingers.” (prosthetic arm, steampunk) “Sasha carried one of the most unusual canes Mara had ever seen: it was longer than might be considered useful to someone her size, and hollow, its walls so thin it surely couldn’t hold her weight. Mara watched as Sasha swept the cane ahead of her. At first she thought Sasha was merely clearing a path, but then the cane struck a large rock, and Sasha neatly sidestepped it having never been told it was there. Ah, that solved the mystery, Mara thought: the hollow stick vibrated in Sasha’s hands when it struck, and its sound told her what danger she might face.” (white cane, blindness) “Sibatyn clapped his hands over his eyes. ‘Here,’ said Yanit, ‘put your scarf over your eyes and take my arm. I can lead you until the lightning is over.’“ (avoiding flashing lights, photosensitive epilepsy) “‘She grows quite ill on bread, even Rosie’s best,’ Sam lamented. ‘Can’t keep a bit of weight on her. It isn’t proper, for a hobbit.’ Gandalf nodded. ‘Have you considered, perhaps, feeding her on Elf-bread? She may take well to grains not often found in the Shire.’“ (special diet, Celiac disease, food allergies) I literally had to think harder about what disabilities I wanted to represent here than I did about how to represent them. It isn’t hard. You have no excuse. shiraglassman OP is spot on. Also, thank you @prismatic-bell for including the food intolerances/allergies one – that’s pretty much exactly how I handled it in my series. As with all of these, and indeed with many other forms of representation that sometimes get pushback in SFF, it’s just a matter of wording it in genre-friendly terms. Sometimes I get the feeling some people forget that’s an option, or it doesn’t occur to them. But obviously there is also often ablism and assumptions at play. (I heard Gandalf’s lines in Sir Ian’s voice so that was fun :P ) crankyteapot oh oh oh! Witch Hat Atelier is such a good example regarding including disability and accessibility in fantasy. There are two prominent characters that require mobility aid, specifically a sealchair.(since it’s powered by a magical seal) There’s one who has an incredibly lavish chair since he is rich and powerful and a much less complex one for a street performer kid who can’t afford anything fancy. (The main character and her friend spend like, an entire issue trying to figure out how to make a better accessibility device for him since the hooves have a hard time going up and down stairs / steeper slopes). (i wont spoil what they come up with but its pretty dang neat) Apart from the mobile accessibility, there’s also an instance where one of the mentor characters gives a kid a headband with a sound muting seal to help with his sensitive hearing, one character uses a lens in his glasses to help with light sensitivity, and one of the prominent characters has colourblindness which affects his day to day life visibly, and it’s shown later on how he learns to get around it and its really neat!!! divinesilverdingo What do I say to someone if their argument is “Healing magic that regrows limbs/cures diseases.” or whatever, because I have had that argument so many times it’s tiring. alex51324 I would start by saying,“So, in this setting, healing magic is available to absolutely everyone? Cool! What’s the system for providing it? How many magic healers are there (by geographic area or by population)? Is there, like, one stationed in every podunk village, or do they travel around on a predetermined route, or is there like a bat-signal, or what?” “Also, depending on what the answer is, you might need to figure out whether there are any limitations on how long after the injury the healing can take place–if you’ve got healers riding circuit through the hinterlands, suppose someone cuts off a limb a week after the healer leaves: will they still be able to heal it when they come around again the next year?” “Speaking of, I assume people diein this setting, yeah? So the only possible outcomes of an injury or illness are either ‘you are instantly and completely healed by magic, with no lingering effects whatsoever’ or ‘you are dead,’ right? That’s boundto have some kind of effects on society–damned if I know what they are, but you’dbetter have some idea; this is your setting after all.” “And, circling back around to how the system works, if magical healingservices are available to everyone, the healers can’t be charging directly for it–so who ispaying them, or if they aren’t being paid, what do they live on? I guess it could be sliding-scale, but in that case, how is it decided which healers work in the places where rich people live, and which ones heal the poor? While we’re on the subject of working conditions for magical healers,is it something anyone can learn to do, or is it an inborn ability? If it’s inborn, are individuals with the ability obligatedto work for the Magic Healing Service? If they are, explain how that’s not slavery. (Or if we’re acknowledging that it’s slavery, what effect does this have on the plot?) If not, how are people recruited to the magical healing service, and what other career options might they have?” “For instance, Is there magic cosmetic surgery? If you can afford it, can you have a magic healer grow you some extralimbs? Can you have them grow your child to the height/weight/appearance you choose? Now that I think about it, does this healing ability work on livestock? If it does, do people in this setting slaughter livestock for meat, or do they just cut off the bits they want to eat and have a magic-user grow them back?” “Oh, you…didn’t think about any of that? And you have no plans to start? So, your setting has healing magic that can regrow limbs and cure diseases with no after-effects, but the only difference it makes is that there are no disabled people. Anywhere. It does not affect society in any way, or have any implications for the story you’re telling. Okay. That’s…an approach, I guess.” That’s what I would say, more or less. Words to that effect. the-bluebonnet-bandit its interesting that when people say “healing magic” they never consider magic used to let Disabled folks live or improve their lives (magic mobility aids, pain meds, artifices, communication spells…) - its always just “healing” with the intent to erase us. Not that health is a valid right to existence… but these people should also consider that not all disabled folks are “unhealthy” or WANT to be made “non disabled”. How would your “total healing” even work on people who have nothing “unhealthy” about them other than they can’t look, speak, or act like YOU. You just invented magical eugenics… not health care. script-a-world I think we’ve reblogged this one before, but it was a version without the last couple of reblogs. There are some interesting implications to inform your worldbuilding here. “The earliest records of wheeled furniture are an inscription found on a stone slate in China and a child’s bed depicted in a frieze on a Greek vase, both dating between the 6th and 5th century BCE.[2][3][4][5]The first records of wheeled seats being used for transporting disabled people date to three centuries later in China; the Chinese used early wheelbarrows to move people as well as heavy objects. A distinction between the two functions was not made for another several hundred years, around 525 CE, when images of wheeled chairs made specifically to carry people begin to occur in Chinese art.[5]”
“In 1655, Stephan Farffler, a 22 year old paraplegic watchmaker, built the world’s first self-propelling chair on a three-wheel chassis using a system of cranks and cogwheels.[6][3] However, the device had an appearance of a hand bike more than a wheelchair since the design included hand cranks mounted at the front wheel.[2]
The invalid carriage or Bath chair brought the technology into more common use from around 1760.[7]
In 1887, wheelchairs (“rolling chairs”) were introduced to Atlantic City so invalid tourists could rent them to enjoy the Boardwalk. Soon, many healthy tourists also rented the decorated “rolling chairs” and servants to push them as a show of decadence and treatment they could never experience at home.[8]
In 1933 Harry C. Jennings, Sr. and his disabled friend Herbert Everest, both mechanical engineers, invented the first lightweight, steel, folding, portable wheelchair.[9] Everest had previously broken his back in a mining accident. Everest and Jennings saw the business potential of the invention and went on to become the first mass-market manufacturers of wheelchairs. Their “X-brace” design is still in common use, albeit with updated materials and other improvements. The X-brace idea came to Harry from the men’s folding “camp chairs / stools”, rotated 90 degrees, that Harry and Herbert used in the outdoors and at the mines.[citation needed]
