NotNormativelyHuman 321
mass society and of a capitalist exchangeeconomy which thrives, as
ComaroffandComaroffhaveshown,onthespectralcharacterofwhatis
being exchanged. In such an economy where the disabled are
prototypical instances of "non-producers in an exchange economy"
(Mitchell and Synder, "Masquerades of Impairment" 38) contacts with
other people hardly ever go beyond the status of a casual encounter, of
the "brutal indifference, the unfeeling isolation of each in his private
interest," shown by Melville and theorized by Engels. With the
"dissolution of mankind into monads, of which each one has a separate
principle, the world of atoms.. ." (Engels 57), disability, like so much
else, has become a surface phenomenon, the identificatory modality of
which I have repeatedly spoken in this chapter. "Surface" here does not
mean that impairments are of secondary, superficial nature but rather
thatthesurfaceisallpeoplehavetogobyinmodernsocietieswhere,as
DeborahStonehasnoted,"people'ssensethattheycouldunderstandone
another"(33)hasbyandlargeatrophied.
Markers of (Un)Certainty: "Age," "Disability" and Communicative
Interaction
"Aging," "old age," "disability" are personal experiences, but also
experiences where socio-cultural norms resonate within the embodied
livesofindividuals.Theynamesubjectsorsubjectpositionswhosecivic
identitymaterializesitselfinlivingbodies.Theexperienceoflatelifeor
disability is one where the private is always already public, circulating,
in communal debates about participation, civic rights and roles,
entitlementsandappropriatebehavior.Theoverviewpresentedaboveof
these experiences must necessarily remain incomplete, given the wide
varietyofnon-normativeembodimentsandtheequallyextensivearsenal
of resonances these solicit in the general culture. What I hope to have
shown nonetheless is that these forms of "peripheral embodiment"
(MitchellandSnyder,BiopoliticsofDisability31,180-203)donothave
astablereferentinbodilyconditions(betheymentalorphysical)butare
instead realized in communicative interaction in the public domain, as
iterative failure to conform to the norms of human embodiment (Heyes
121).WhatÉtienneBalibarhasarguedinasimilarbutdifferentcontext
canthereforebealsousefullysaidaboutlateordisabledlife:"Notwhat
is ideally 'in' each individual (as a form or substance), or what would