A professor from the University of Waterloo who is an expert on the representation of disability in culture, policy and media is available to speak about the Paralympic Games.

Professor Jay Dolmage, from the Faculty of Arts at the University of Waterloo, believes that there are contradictions around disability and sponsorship at the Paralympics.

"The Paralympics have become little more than an opportunity for sponsors to use inspirational stories to sell products.  The games also provide an opportunity for the real inequities experienced by people with disabilities to be hidden.

In one particularly problematic example from the 2012 London Paralympics, Atos Healthcare was one of the games’ major sponsors, and yet was also the company the British government hired to impose an austerity crackdown on people making disability claims in the UK. In Russia, Human Rights Watch released a report in advance of the Paralympics indicting Russia for its treatment of people with disabilities.

The true risk is that the Paralympics will do nothing to change these conditions, and instead will simply hide them behind feel-good stories about athletes apparently overcoming their disabilities."

Professor Dolmage studies writing and the rhetoric of disability, and is the editor of the Canadian Journal of Disability Studies, which foregrounds critical disability studies and rights. He is also the author of the book Disability Rhetoric.

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