' Digital Technology and Disability in Australian Social Life', paper for The Australian Sociological Association (TASA) conference, 25-27 November 2014, UniSA, Adelaide

1. Digital Technology and Disability in
Australian Social Life
The Australian Sociological Association
(TASA) conference, 25-27 November
2014, UniSA, Adelaide
Gerard Goggin @ggoggin
Dept of Media & Communications
University of Sydney

2. digital technology, disability &
Australian social life
Argument of paper (1):
• technology is key to contemporary social life
in Australia
• technology is vital to the lives of Australians
with disabilities; & to the project of justice,
equality & democracy as it
• disability & impairment have intimate
relationships with technology

3. digital technology, disability &
Australian social life
Argument of paper (2)
• disability has much to tell us about the social
relations of technology & indeed what
technology is & how it is made (& reproduced)
• For example, much technology has its origins
(its imaginaries) in disability – such as the
telephone; yet these (disability) histories of
general technologies are obscured/illegible

4. Digital technology, disability &
Australian social life
Argument of paper (3):
• If we know little about sociologies of technology
in Australia (true?), then we know even less
about sociology of disability & technology
• If we cared about such a sociology, how would we
go about it?
• in the meantime, assuming the importance of
technology to social life (that comprehends & is
reconstructed by understandings of disability &
diversity), what does our social policy concerning
technology look like? Is it good enough? (No.)

5. Overview of research (1)
• this paper is part of my ARC Future Fellowship project
(2014-2017) Disability and Digital Technology:
Accessible Design, Global Media Policy, and Human
Rights
• Project explores disability & digital technology - & how
these unfold in relation to global notions of human
rights, media policy, & technology production & design
• Project builds on 20+ years of work with disability
activists & DPOs, consumers & NGO & policy makers on
disability & digital technology – see Gerard Goggin &
Christopher Newell, Digital Disability (2003)

6. Overview of Research (2)
The Disability & Digital Technology project has 4 parts:
1) Cultural & media histories of disability & technology
2) Disability human rights & technology (e.g. how did the
rights to technology get written into the UN Convention
on Rights of Persons with Disabilities? What do they
mean? What’s excluded?)
3) Accessible technology & design case studies: how is
mobile phone being designed for disability/accessibility
(or not) in countries such as India, Indonesia, Mexico,
China (e.g. global South, which is changing the face of
how we understand Internet & mobiles)
4) Activating rights for better technology design: what is role
of policy (in media policy; technology policy; human rights
policy) & domains of practice

7. Overview of Research (3)
– papers so far
Meryl Alper, Liz Ellcessor, Katie Ellis, and Gerard Goggin. ‘Reimagining
the Good Life With Disability: Communication, New Technology, and
Humane Connections.’ In Communication and the Good Life, edited by
Helen (Hua) Wang. New York: Peter Lang, 2015.
Katie Ellis and Gerard Goggin. ‘Disability, Locative Media, and Complex
Ubiquity.’ In Ubiquitous Computing, Complexity and Culture, edited by
Ulrik Ekman, Jay David Bolter, Lily Diaz, Morten Søndergaard, and
Maria Engberg. New York: Routledge, 2015
Gerard Goggin. ‘Communication Rights and Disability Online: Policy
and Technology after the World Summit on the Information Society
(WSIS),’ Information, Communication & Society (2015). DOI:
10.1080/1369118X.2014.989879
Gerard Goggin. ‘New Ideas for Digital Affordability: Is a Paradigm Shift
Possible?’ Australian Journal of Telecommunications and the Digital
Economy 2.2 (2014), article 42, http://doi.org/10.7790/ajtde.v2n2.42

8. Technology & Disability
in Australian Society
& Sociology

9. wide view of technology
techniques, tools, systems, objects, artefacts,
infrastructures, networks
• planes, roads, bikes, strollers, wheelchairs
• garden & farm tools, milking machines, cheese
factories, solar power, coal seam gas
• health, medical & hospital technology,
pharmaceuticals, mobile health apps
• print, radio, TV, screen print, digital art &
design, Internet, mobiles, Internet of things

10. disability + tech: everyday life
• Disability is now recognized as a significant part
of social life, identity, and the life course
• Over the past twenty years, digital technology –
especially computers, the Internet, mobile media,
social media, apps, geolocation technologies, and
now, wearable computers, and even technologies
such as driverless cars – have emerged as a
significant part of the mediascape, cultural
infrastructure, social support system, and
personal identity and repertoire of many people
with disabilities.

11. technology in social life
• from specialized & assistive technology to mainstream
• from exceptional to ordinary, everyday – tools for
living, information, communication, entertainment,
relationships, pleasure
• contemporary disability – and society broadly - involves
technology; so everyone has a stake in it
• technology itself is about social/power relations –
technology can be regarded as ‘congealed social
relations’ or ‘society made durable’ (Bruno Latour,
1991); or involvement in technologies of
governmentality (e.g. work of Paul Henman)

12. but for technology … life
• Many of us, including people with disability,
rely on technology, e.g.
– Internet for a very wide range of people
– Screen readers for Blind people
– Tablet computers for people with cognitive
impairments
– Sensors & switches in ‘intelligent homes’, to
enable people with dexterity/mobility
impairments to control their home environments
– Medical & health technologies

13. technology & citizenship
possibilities of our lives
intimacies we nurture &
cherish
ways that we exercise
citizenship in our
communities (locally,
nationally & internationally)
have a strong relationship
with technology

14. citizenship under
technological conditions
1. technology is how
we practice
politics
2. technology is the
setting in which
citizenship is
defined
Darrin Barney
Canadian political philosopher

15. theory/research problems
• Theories & traditions of social research & social policy have not seen
technology as central
– technology neglected in sociology; though starting to catch up with ‘digital
sociology’ turn; tech has thrived in ‘STS’ (science & technology studies) & 4Ss
(Society for Social Studies of Science)
– The career of disability in sociology has been also a fitful/sequestered process
– scant disability studies work on technology (now starting to emerge, e.g. with
work of Jonathon Sterne, Liz Ellcessor, Katie Ellis, Mara Mills; pioneers like Kate
Seelman)
• we lack something summative & ground-breaking like Judy Wajcman’s
Feminist Confronts Technology (1991)
• classic disability & technology work centres in rehabilitation sciences,
engineering, medicine, health sciences, professions; little work on
disability & technology in sociology, communication, cultural & media
studies (emerging here too);
• Interestingly enough, there is a thread of work on ageing & technology in
sociology; &, of course, strong relations between ageing & disability
• A really good but dated study that suitably renovated & modified could
inspire an Australian study is Sandra Tanenbaum’s Engineering Disability:
Public Policy & Compensatory Technology (Temple UP, 1986

16. Policy problems: everyday techology
• In technology, disability has been seen as ‘specialized’, not
mainstream – needing intervention of professionals, specialized
engineers and professionals
• Technology & disability also typically seen in Manichean terms –
salvation (‘revolution’ of iPad for people with intellectual disabilities
vs. juggernaut/cultural violence of cochlear implant for Deaf
communities)
• In social policy, technology has been seen as specialized topic –
matches the dominance of ‘assistive technology’ industry &
paradigm as approach to disability and technology
• Tech emerges in mainstream social policy 1990s with importance of
telecommunications affordability and accessibility, then Internet
‘disability digital divide’ - see Paul T. Jaeger, Disability and the
Internet: Confronting a Digital Divide (2012)
• This should have now altered dramatically – technology should be
(but isn’t really) a pivotal topic in social policy

18. From ‘specialized’, ’assistive’,
’compensatory’ to mainstream?
The majority of people want access to the
same market-leading devices that the rest
of the population use. They want to choose
from the same library of apps and
participate in the same activities online.
Scott Hollier, “Opinion: Do we still need specialist technology?”
Media Access, 13 June, 2013, mediaaccess.org.au

19. From ‘specialized’ to ‘mainstream’
technology: case study of histories &
development of location technology
Based on Katie Ellis and Gerard Goggin. ‘Disability, Locative Media, and
Complex Ubiquity.’ In Ubiquitous Computing, Complexity and Culture,
edited by Ulrik Ekman, Jay David Bolter, Lily Diaz, Morten Søndergaard,
and Maria Engberg. New York: Routledge, 2015

20. sonic pathfinder (Tony Heyes,
Melbourne-based)

21. Since being totally blind I feel much more traffic
vulnerable, not so much getting lost or anything,
just getting run over. And I have a secondary
fear of actually causing injury to another
pedestrian when I'm run down. So the mobility
stuff [using an ultrasound sensor] is highly
valued.
-- Tom, a 46 year old Blind man, from Adelaide,
South Australian
Quoted in Deborah Lupton and Wendy Seymour, “Technology, Selfhood and Physical
Disability,” Social Science & Medicine 50 (2000): 1856.

22. A dog is far more suitable than using something like
a mote sensor and a sonic pathfinder, for example,
which are electronic aids that are either hand-held,
or one actually sits on your head, like a head band
with ear plugs and a big thing across the forehead
and stuff … [I]t’s socially frightening to a lot of
people … Whereas, for example, to walk around
with a dog is completely and utterly socially
acceptable. And I think with technologies, the more
obtrusive it is, the more offensive it can become to
some people.
-- Margie, a 24 year old Blind woman
Quoted in Lupton and Seymour, “Technology, Selfhood and Physical Disability”, 2000

23. In the event of service disruption [to public
transportation], the disabled traveller needs
information in an appropriate form about
suitable alternative methods of reaching their
destination … Mobile phones equipped with
cameras can also be used to send visual and
location information to a service centre where
an operator can then guide the user to their
desired destination.
John Gill, “Priorities for Technological Research for Visually Impaired People,” Visual
Impairment Research 7 (2005): 59-61.

24. Google, ‘WalkyTalky’, https://www.google.com.au/accessibility/on-the-go.html

25. Google, ‘Android Explore by Touch’,
https://www.google.com.au/accessibility/on-the-go.html

26. Exchange
Telstra
blog, 1
May 2014

27. “OK Glass, what’s this?” With four short words, 31-
year-old Kelly Schulz, 97 per cent blind since birth,
is given a glimpse of what’s in front of her. Google’s
head-mounted computer snaps a photo and a reads
a description into her right ear. “It is a male
bathroom”, a computerised voice tells her. Other
times, “it is a $20 note”, “a bottle of skim milk”, or
“a can of BBQ baked beans”. Schulz trialled a
prototype app on Glass for a day, and though she
stresses that the best piece of technology has four
legs, a wet nose and responds to the name Gallia,
she says Glass has massive potential.
“Google Glass and Telstra come to the help of the disabled,” News.com.au, 5 May,
2014

28. Google Glass has the potential to radically
impact the lives of people with disabilities. Will
you partner with us in making Google Glass
more accessible?
-- Indiegogo crowdfunding platform campaign
“Make it Happen! Google Glass for People with Disabilities,” December, 13, 2013,
http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/make-it-happen-google-glass-for-people-with-disabilities.

29. Policy problems: assistive tech part of
solution but not whole framework
‘Recent developments in Australia illustrates that new
human rights legislation has successfully changed
conditions into problems and has shifted discourse to
whole of life outcomes and entitlement, thus broadening
and legitimating the role of AT beyond independence and
function’
With NDIS as ‘policy window’:
‘The task now is to inform the enactment of this major
policy framework with the expertise of the AT sector,
including perspectives of consumers; AT Practitioners; and
the AT supply industry. This task was commenced by the
peak body for AT in Australia, the Australian Rehabilitation
and Assistive Technology Association (ARATA)’
Layton, ‘Problems, Policies & Politics’, p. 4

30. A number of reports have critically examined
current AT service delivery in the light of current
human rights and social justice developments,
and found it wanting in terms of resource
allocation and priority setting and scope of
provision. Overall, ‘‘people with various
disabilities are unable to access the aids,
equipment and technology essential to their
daily functioning, and are unable to access the
support required to get them out of bed in the
morning’’
Natasha Layton, ‘Problems, Policies and Politics: making the case for
better assistive technology provision in Australia’, Disability and
Rehabilitation, 2014

31. Theory/research problems: everyday
technology
• Theories & traditions of social research & social policy
have not seen technology as central
– Technology neglected in sociology; though starting to catch
up with ‘digital sociology’ turn; tech has thrived in ‘STS’
(science & technology studies) & 4Ss (Society for Social
Studies of Science) – but not in mainstream sociology
– scant disability studies work on technology (now starting
to emerge, e.g. with work of Jonathon Sterne, Liz Ellcessor,
Katie Ellis, Mara Mills; pioneers like Kate Seelman);we lack
something like Judy Wajcman’s Feminist Confronts
Technology (1991); classic disability & technology work
centres in rehabilitation sciences, engineering, medicine,
health sciences, professions; little work on disability in
communication, cultural & media studies (emerging here
too)

32. disability techology as ‘specialized’
(not pervasive, everyday, mainstream)
• In social policy, technology has been seen as specialized
topic – matches the dominance of ‘assistive technology’
industry & paradigm as approach to disability and
technology
• Tech emerges in mainstream social policy 1990s with
importance of telecommunications affordability and
accessibility, then Internet ‘disability digital divide’ - see
Paul T. Jaeger, Disability and the Internet: Confronting a
Digital Divide (2012)
• this has altered dramatically – tech now pivotal topic in
social policy

33. The National Disability Insurance Scheme is not
designed to provide direct support for all
Australians with a disability … The NDIS will aim
to provide an entitlement for aids, equipment,
personal attendant care and other non-income
supports to around 460,000 Australians with
significant non-age related disabilities. The
objective of the NDIS is to address the chronic
unmet need of a group of people who have
been under-supported for decades.
Senator Mitch Fifield, Assistant Minister for Social Services, National Press
Club Address, November 2013

34. Policy problems: everyday technology
• In public policy, economic approaches have
dominated, e.g. productivity approach to technology,
seen in Productivity Commission seminal report
Disability Care and Support (2011), which shaped
NDIS

35. ‘Many tasks performed by carers cannot be
easily substituted with aids and appliances, and
so the scope for dramatic increases in
productivity from more intensive use of capital
and technological innovation cannot be
expected over the short term. In a report
entitled ‘How many wheelchairs can you push at
once?’, Allen Consulting (2008, p. v) argued that
there was poor scope for short-run productivity
improvement in Victorian social services … ‘
Productivity Commission, Disability Care and Support (2011, vol. 2, pp.
730)

36. The wheelchair example oversimplifies the scope
for productivity gains over the longer run. The
history of the wheelchair illustrates the progress of
technology for people with a disability. Prior to the
Second World War people with a disability only
could get heavy manual wheelchairs, which would
often have required the aid of a support person.
However, with the invention of the motorised
wheelchair during WWII … people have had access
to increasingly sophisticated and lighter
wheelchairs over which they have complete control.
Productivity Commission, Disability Care and Support (2011, vol. 2, pp. 730)

37. ‘Equally, modification of motor vehicles and
driver training has allowed some people with a
disability to be mobile without having to use
specialist disability transport services. Moreover,
increased mobility can enhance labour market
and social participation …’
Productivity Commission, Disability Care and Support (2011, vol. 2, pp. 730)

38. ‘some forms of assistive technology that improve
quality of life, productivity and participation already
exist, but their adoption is limited through
rationing, which should be relieved significantly
with the establishment of the NDIS’
‘the greater scope for competitive pressures under
the NDIS will tend to shift people from less
productive agencies to more productive’
‘after their initial introduction, manufactured aids
and appliances tend to decrease in price over time,
encouraging their wider adoption. This process may
be enhanced by bulk purchasing or other
procurement strategies used by the NDIA or DSOs’
Productivity Commission, Disability Care and Support (2011, vol. 2, pp. 730)

39. ‘innovation will come from people with a
disability as users of generic technologies’
‘Technological aids will also make it easier for a
broader range of workers to support people
with a disability’
‘The Commission has recommended the
creation of an “innovation fund” for service
providers to encourage productivity in the
disability sector’
Productivity Commission, Disability Care and
Support (2011, vol. 2, pp. 730, 733)

40. economic-influenced public policy on
disability & tech
• good recommendations from Productivity
Commission 2011 report, influencing & being
implemented in NDIS/NDIA processes

41. problems: everyday technology
• lack of research
– base line picture on use & consumption by technology of people with
disabilities is missing
– textured picture of distinctive uses/non-uses of technology (e.g. qualitative,
participatory, ethnographic research) is missing
– dispersed, incomplete picture on role of technology in social & political
participation
Audit of Disability Research in Australia (Centre for Disability Research & Policy, May, 2014) finds
that research on ‘safety and security, transport and communication, housing and the built
environment, social relationships and community and civic participation’ is ‘significantly under-represented
in ‘research base’
• on the upside, much more engagement & voices & perspective of people
with disabilities in public sphere, especially through online means (blogs,
social media) & also engagement in consultation, advocacy, activist,
debate

42. ABS data on technology?
‘Q22: Does the person ever need someone to help with, or be
with them for, communication activities?
• Issues: This question invites an ambiguous or contradictory
reading – most communication activities involve being with
someone else.
• It also again invites a perverse outcome and is based on a pre-technological
conception of disability support. This question
would mean that a person who is blind and has someone read
them a book would answer yes, while another person who is
blind borrowing an audio book or downloading one over a
specialised device would answer no.’
PWD 2013 submission to ABS on 2016 Census

43. Productivity Commission on tech
research priorities
Participants’ views: area for research
• Innovation in assistive technology, particularly, computer-based
technology …
• The benefits of assistive technology for older people and people
with disabilities
Particular areas that the Commission considers should be a priority for
research
• relate to capacity building of the community, NDIS participants and
providers; the
• use of technology; employment and social participation; and early
intervention
Productivity Commission, Disability Care and Support (2011, vol. 2, pp.
586-587 )

44. Problems: everyday technology
• Access to tech
– reasons to suggest access remains major problem
– meanings of access need to be thought about/discussed in their
complexity, especially when it comes to design
• Accessibility of tech
– bound up with access; also a major, ongoing problem
– e.g. web accessibility is perhaps the best known area of effort &
policy (e.g. National Transition Strategy) – yet many govt & private
websites remain inaccessible; and mobile web/device accessibility
of websites is still not a major goal
– a key issue is the proliferation of technology, devices, software,
etc; this implies that accessible interfaces are crucial, as a
translation zone between technology (e.g. accessible operating
systems like the Apple OS on its computers, smartphones, and
tablets)

45. Problems: everyday technology
• Disability still an ‘add-on’ in much technology;
inclusive design approaches still have a long
way to go
• the technology market has been remarkable,
but the ‘business’ of technology for disability
often lacks (perceived) profitability
• Business cultures still often lack in
understanding opportunity for disability
innovation

46. disability tech
social policy framework:
current elements
• National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) –
responsibility: NDIA, Minister for Social Services
• National Broadband Network (NBN, such as it is):
responsibility: NBN Board, Minister for Communications
Cf. Robert Morsillo, One Down, Two to Go: Public Policy in Service of an Available, Affordable and
Accessible NBN for People with Disabilities, Telecommunications Journal of Australia, 61.2 (2011)
• Web accessibility (National Transitional Strategy)
responsibility: AGIMO (Aust Govt Info Management Office,
Dept of Finance)
• Telecommunications affordability (phones really, & bit of
mobiles & internet): responsibility: Telstra, industry;
Minister for Communication
Cf. Justine Humphreys, Homeless and Connected 2014 report – on homeless people with disabilities &
mobile Internet tech

47. disability tech policy framework:
current elements
• Assistive technology – responsibility: state governments,
Fed govt, NDIS/NDIA
• Standards setting - responsibility: various, Standards
Australia
• Procurement policies on accessible technology –
responsibility: Federal & state govts setting framework
Wayne Hawkins, ‘Australia’s Missing Accessible Information and Communications
Technology Procurement Policy’, Telecommunications Journal of Australia, 2011,
William Tibben & Gunela Astbrink, Accessible Communications: Tapping the Potential in
Public ICT Procurement Policy, 2013 report
• Technology in education – responsibility: providers,
education depts, Human Rights Commission
• Technology in workplace – responsibility: providers,
industry associations, HRC

48. disability tech policy framework:
current elements
• Community informatics, technology in civil society –
responsibility: NGOs, peak bodies, limited govt &
private funding
• Statistics & research – little systematic & publicly
available responsibility: Australian Institute of Health
and Welfare; agencies (esp. now NDIS); regulators (e.g.
ACMA – Aust Communications & Media Authority);
NGOs providing much (e.g. ACCAN – Aust
Communications Consumer Action Network, Media
Access) also industry associations
• Social media platforms – responsibility: social media
companies such as Facebook, Twitter, Google

49. Disability tech policy framework
• Innovation policy
-- is existing national policy adequate?
- What are specific disability aspects to innovation?
(e.g. case of Google Glass) – what can economic
incentives to innovative with disability & technology,
esp. for social policy purposes?

50. Disability tech policy framework
• The disability design turn – design as cross-cutting
area of focus for disability, justice,
participation – doing diversity differently
– Graham Pullin, Disability Meets Design (MIT, 2009)
– Jos Boys, Doing Disability Differently (Routledge,
2014)

51. Ideal elements of social policy
framework for disability & technology
• Comprehensive and articulated across major
policy areas & life domains for technology
– UN CRPD good starting point
• Cross-referenced against, articulated via, social
policy objectives
• Proper research base and statistics on
technology & disability
• Support for inclusive design approaches
• Important of co-design, participatory design,
users involvement in design

52. references
Meryl Alpers, ‘Augmentative, alternative, and assistive: Reimagining the history of
mobile computing and disability’, IEEE Annals of the History of Computing,
forthcoming
Ellcessor, E. (2014). <ALT=”Textbooks”>: Web accessibility myths as negotiated
industrial lore. Critical Studies in Media Communication
Katie Ellis & Gerard Goggin. Disability and the Media (Palgrave, 2015)
Gerard Goggin. ‘Innovation & Disability.’ M/C: Media and Culture 11.3 (2008)
McNaughton, D., & Light, J. (2013). The iPad and mobile technology revolution: Benefits
and challenges for individuals who require augmentative and alternative
communication. Augmentative and Alternative Communication, 29, 107-116.
Mills, M. (2011). Deafening: Noise and the engineering of communication in the
telephone system. Grey Room, 43, 118-143.
Moser, I., & Law, J. (2003). Making voices: New media technologies, disabilities, and
articulation. In G. Liestøl, A. Morrison, & T. Rasmussen (Eds.), Digital media revisited:
Theoretical and conceptual innovation in digital domains. Cambridge, MA & London:
MIT Press.
Rodan, D., Ellis, K., & Lebeck, P. (2014). Disability, obesity and ageing: Popular media
identifications. London: Ashgate.
Jonathan Sterne and Dylan Mulvin,‘The Low Acuity for Blue: Perceptual Technics and
American Color Television’, Journal of Visual Culture 13:2 (August 2014): 118-138.