Hoffmann Mária Rita:

Ableism and disability on land and in waters: A dolphin’s tale about people, paying a special tribute to a fabulous dolphin


2022/1 | #ableism #empowerment #identity #power | DOI: 10.31287/FT.hu.2022.1.6

This paper recounts Winter’s, the empowering, prosthetic-tailed Dolphin‘s life. The author aims to tell and reflect on tales and truths regarding Winter’s incredible story – by relating to the dolphin’s life from various perspectives in order to record and highlight both well-known and rarely considered aspects. She aims to initiate readers to think over contexts of defenselessness and power. Through Winter’s unique life-journey, readers face sensitive topics as disability and business, the dignity of the defenseless, role models and accepting disabled identity. The author introduces an extraordinary character, a dolphin who, by her strong will, challenges ableist paradigms both in objective and subjective tones. The author’s personal tone is aimed to encourage readers to question and rethink the consequences of power inequalities and the role we can play in bettering the world, as Winter the dolphin did during the sixteen years she spent with us.