One of the first things I came across when I started browsing Facebook this morning was this very interesting academic paper by my friend Darryl Sellwood, et al. Darryl is fast becoming a great disability studies academic and writer, who I must admit puts me to shame. The paper broadly argues that the choices and decisions surrounding Alternative and Augmentative Communication (AAC) should be primarily made by AAC users; that is, people who actually use communication aids should be the primary voice in the future of the field, the rules, customs and habits surrounding it. I find that perfectly obvious, and it gets no argument from me.

Reading the paper, though, I came across quite an interesting phrase which stuck in my mind. The text seems to switch from area to area quite a bit, presumably as it goes from sections written by one of it’s five authors to another. One of the authors refers to AAC users as ‘cyborgs of necessity not choice’, a phrase which resonated with me quite a bit, and which I think needs exploring. In my 2014 MA thesis, I touch briefly on how the equipment I use to communicate and move around could be said to evoke Borg implants. The Borg are, of course, the cyborgs of Star Trek. When I was writing my thesis, I think I meant this as quite a cute, throwaway remark; yet I am obviously not the only person to pick up upon the correlation. Does the use of specialist equipment by disabled people really render us cyborgs? What could the sociocultural implications of that be? Could we really seem like the hostile, unfeeling drones bent on assimilating every other lifeform which Star Trek depicts? After all, most mainstream science fiction franchises frame cybernetic organisms, from The Borg to Darth Vader, as some form of aggressive, malevolent enemy. To be honest being called a cyborg, albeit one of necessity, throws up a few quite dark implications and connotations which aren’t all that comfortable, yet which I think need looking a bit deeper into.