[Urbanstudy] City of Voices

[Deepa Palaniappan]

Hi all,
I am researching on the topic,  Invisible in New Delhi: Spatial Narrative of
the Disabled in City 'Public Spaces, for the Sarai-student stipendship
programme. I seek guidance from the group and request for inputs on my
postings.
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We have seen disabled people on the roads.  We have helped them get on to
the right bus. We offer them seats, allow them to avoid queues and let them
go straight to the counters. We are also aware of the rhetoric on making the
city 'disabled-friendly' and constructing an *enabling *environment. City is
seen as the villainous, treacherous space, while planners are our evil
minded, selfish, able bodied people who insist on denying mobility to the
disabled. Of late, the 'kind hearted', 'sensitive' planners and policy
makers who think out-of-the-box, want to make the city space more
disable-friendly. They are fighting the good fight. Meanwhile the funds are
pouring in. We are told that the good fight has nothing to do with the
massive inflow of funds. Of course. So long as every body is able to move
everywhere in the city.



Yet, beyond the rhetoric one wonders, what *is *the city experience for a
disabled person? Do they at any time feel belonged to the city? Is the city,
in their eyes, a space that is marked by one obstacle after another that
needs to be deciphered and overcome? What are the markers that make them
feel 'belonged' to the city? Is there an unacknowledged attachment to the
city for whatever reason? If so, what are the stories? My point is, we do
know the stories. We hear it all the time. A blind person tilting her head
in a bus stop to 'see' and understand the bus stop scene. That is one
narrative. This paper is an attempt to share such narratives. Its my belief
that sharing these will create a new space for an alternate understanding of
the impaired world. A space in which 'pity' and 'compensation' is replaced
by 'understanding' and 'acceptance', where disability is viewed as
difference. It gives a new meaning to the construction of a disable-friendly
city and the realization that such a city cannot be an end in itself. Unless
the perceptions change, even a barrier-free city will continue to
discriminate people with impairments through pity, disrespect and lack of
awareness.



This project is an attempt to share my experience with the people with
impairments and explore an alternate understanding that, they are definitely
not disabled, but are dis-abled by the society and its prejudices. There is
a whole new world out there, which accepts our world and its spaces, with
magnanimity and without any grudge. Pity and lack of awareness hurts them
more than your barriered city. This project is an attempt to grasp the
alternate reality.   The dark city without lights, the silent city without
noise. Yet, the dark city is loved for its sound bytes. The sounds of unseen
vendors, the aural vibrancy in a bazaar and yes, the voices. City is full of
voices. Have you realized that ever? My paper is an attempt to tell you how
it is so.



The proposed study will draw case studies of visually impaired persons who
travel and negotiate the city spaces on an everyday basis. In future
postings, I shall share their city stories. In fact, their spatial
narratives weaved without visuals in the case of the vision impaired is
truly an interesting phenomena. We are used to the visuals of the city. This
project is an attempt to explore an alternate city that is equally vibrant,
equally colorful albeit in a colorless and sometimes soundless manner.



For now, before I conclude I would like to introduce Ajanta whose
experiences I will share in the next posting. Ajanta is an young (completely
blind) woman, teaching in an institute for the blind. She stays alone in a
single room bachelor apartment with an attached kitchen, located in one of
the by lanes in the sub lanes of Munirka. She shares the bathroom with her
neighbors, living in adjacent rooms in the same building, who happen to be
men. I have been to her room few times in the past two years. Once she
cooked elaborate meal for our group of 4 friends. Yet she is completely
blind. She travels alone all the time. Is life a sad state of affairs for
her? How does she negotiate her life as a single woman in the city which
would often cross with her identity as a blind woman? Does she enjoy the
challenge that the city poses in front of her? These are the questions I
have sought to explore in my interaction with her and these experiences I
will share in the next posting. Meanwhile I request the group to provide
input on the ideas shared so far.
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