Leveling Health Hierarchies: Finding My Way as A Chronically Ill Academic

Area of Science:

• Sociology of Health and Illness
• Disability Studies
• Academic Lived Experience

Background:

• Thirty years of living with Crohn's Disease informs this reflection.
• Existing theories may not fully capture the experience of chronic illness in academia.
• The need to articulate new possibilities for academics with chronic conditions.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the utility of Managed Meaning of Embodied Experience (MMEE) theory for academics with chronic illness.
• To explore how MMEE can help restory possibilities for living and working with chronic illness.
• To challenge the hierarchical binary between illness and health.

Main Methods:

• Personal reflection on 30 years of living with Crohn's Disease.
• Engagement with Managed Meaning of Embodied Experience (MMEE) theory.
• Application of Simone de Beauvoir's analysis of binaries and reciprocity.

Main Results:

• MMEE theory enables restorying of possibility but is constrained by the assumption that illness is undesirable.
• The theory relies on a hierarchical binary between illness and health.
• Challenging this hierarchy allows chronically ill individuals to be seen as whole subjects.

Conclusions:

• Leveling the ill/healthy hierarchy is crucial for recognizing the wholeness of chronically ill individuals.
• Simone de Beauvoir's concept of reciprocity offers a framework for intersubjective subjectivity construction.
• A path toward wholeness for all people, regardless of health status, can be facilitated by embracing this perspective.