Inhabiting uncertainties: reflections on disability and care practices in the fight assisted housing

Abstract

The theme of assisted housing is recent in both public debates and Brazilian legislation. With an ethnographic work carried out in the city of Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, together with mothers of adults with cognitive disabilities who organized themselves as a movement to fight for the cause of assisted living, I propose, in this work, a reflection on disability and care from your practices and speeches. After all, in seeking other arrangements than the family, these women bring up and are subjected to judgments that say a lot about the disability experience. I focus, therefore, my analysis on the tensions, controversies and moral charges that permeate this litigation, in order to draw attention to the ways in which its trajectories are permeated by regimes in which both deficiency and care work are devalued. I argue, finally, that discussions about the promotion of rights, autonomy and independence of people with disabilities should be accompanied by a reflection about the experience of caregivers, especially mothers. An experience that allows a better understanding of the ways in which cognitive deficiency is dealt with in, in and by our society.

Keywords

• deficiência cognitiva
• cuidado
• moradias assistidas
• relações familiares