Disability in Modern and Contemporary Drama

Abstract

Representations of disability in Western commercial drama have frequently relied on familiar tropes to portray disabled characters as villains, victims, or inspirational heroic overcomers. Often positioned at the margins of the dramatic text, these characters have functioned as comic relief, moral warning, or metaphorical devices through which social, religious, or psychological anxieties are reflected. Such representations, ranging from disability as divine punishment to disability as signifier of evil and immorality, have reduced complex embodiment to a symbolic function. Disability scholars and activists have interrogated canonical works for their reliance on narrative prosthesis and their limited engagement with lived disability experience. At the same time, modern and 21st-century drama have also generated alternative representations. Revisiting 20th-century plays through disability studies reveals opportunities to reinterpret casting, embodiment, and production practices beyond stereotypical and reductive frameworks. Twenty first-century drama foregrounds issues such as disability-led authorship, casting, the medical industrial complex, intersectionality, and access. Within this framework, modern and 21st-century theater offer a dynamic site for rethinking and reproducing disability representation.