Department or Program
English
Abstract
This essay introduces the topic of disability signifiers by extending Stuart Hall’s theory of the floating signifier to disability. Tracing several theoretical interventions into disability studies, I will parse the dialectic pervading these signifiers: how they can perpetuate harmful stigmas associated with disability and how they function as locations of epistemological insight and social critique. Drawing on theories established by Victor LaValle, Audre Lorde, Ferdinand de Saussure, Stuart Hall, Dennis Tyler, and Tobin Siebers, my analysis highlights how disability operates as a "floating signifier," shaped by cultural, historical, and social contexts. Through LaValle's portrayal of Mr. Visserplein, a psychiatric patient characterized as both "Devil" and man, Pepper, an involuntary admit at New Hyde Hospital, and Vincent Van Gogh, one of LaValle’s figureheads of disability, the essay critiques societal stigmatization of disability while affirming its capacity to produce meaning. By juxtaposing LaValle’s fictional narrative with the concept of disability signifiers, the essay underscores the transformative potential of reimagining disability as a complex interplay of embodiment, resilience, and validation.
Level of Access
Open Access
First Advisor
Pickens, Theri
Date of Graduation
5-2025
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Recommended Citation
Wood, Aidan, "The Light that Shines Through the Cracks: Disability Signifiers and Racial Imagination in Victor LaValle’s The Devil in Silver" (2025). Honors Theses. 498.
https://scarab.bates.edu/honorstheses/498
Number of Pages
49
Components of Thesis
1 pdf file
