Negotiating 'normal': how notions of US national identity are (re)constructed in The West Wing

The West Wing was a hugely popular U.S. TV drama series, which ran from 1999-2006 to international acclaim. Its popularity led it to be considered within the Cultural/Media Studies perspective (e.g. Parry-Giles and Parry Giles, 2002; Holbert et al, 2005). However, despite the impairment/illness aspect of the drama series being considered by those interested in health communication (e.g. Zoller and Worrell, 2006), there has been little said on The West Wing from a Disability Studies perspective. We aim to fill this gap by utilizing perspectives on the cultural representation of 'impairment' to, rather than to measure the text as being 'real' or being 'positive', explore what The West Wing can tell us about the role of impairment in our contemporary moment.[Presented at the Society for Disability Studies Conference, 17th-20th June: Tucson, Arizona, USA]