L'acteur trisomique

[lollardfish]

Simyo - Le Theatre 42''
by simyofrance

This is a French cell-phone ad starting an actor with Down syndrome. He is, as a French advocacy group has commented, just a "citizen like any other." Apparently it's the 50th anniversary of the French discovery of the cause of Down Syndrome (by a Father LeJeune, hence not using Down syndrome as the phase). Also, I love the adjective "trisomique" (trisomic). I intend to start using it.

Article here.

h/t to neogrammarian.

Comments

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I have been thinking about your second sentence, and trying to figure out what it means for language and society. My best interpretation is that these sorts of words -- collective nouns for groups not treated well in society -- slowly get encumbered with bad connotations and then need to be jetissoned in favor of other words. It's the colored/negro/black/of-color progression.

But does this have to happen? "Down syndrome child" is just a descriptor.

More is too complicated to write right now.

B

[lollardfish.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've had the same thought.

In the end, it is just a descriptor, but so was Mongoloid Idiot.

So much of how we, as a society, respond to disability is governed by language.

I just want an adjective.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Look at "Mongoloid Idiot." The second word is perjorative right out of the box, but the first word was a simple descriptor in the beginning and became perjorative over the years as people used it. "Retarted" is the same; it's a descriptor of delayed development that turned into a perjorative.

That's why we have to change our descriptors every once in a while; society adds meanings to them that we don't want them to have.

B

[lollardfish.livejournal.com]

Actually Mongoloid was always pejorative too. So say those who study images of Mongols in western society (or at least the guy I knew at Macalester).

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Okay, then. But there are lots of examples: elderly vs senior citizen, invalid/handicapped/something else, etc.

B

[lollardfish.livejournal.com]

I've been pondering this. "Mongoloid" or "Retarded" actually both sound right to me, except that they are pejorative.

Down syndrome child just sounds wrong.