{"id":603,"date":"2025-02-27T11:41:30","date_gmt":"2025-02-27T16:41:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/accessiblehealthcare\/?post_type=chapter&p=603"},"modified":"2025-04-28T11:04:44","modified_gmt":"2025-04-28T15:04:44","slug":"accessing-care","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/accessiblehealthcare\/chapter\/accessing-care\/","title":{"raw":"Defining Care","rendered":"Defining Care"},"content":{"raw":"
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\u201cCare is a feeling, a concept, a practice, a form of labour (both paid and unpaid). Care can connect us. Care can harm us. Care is political and operates within the flow of power. Care work is gendered and racialized. Care is connected to historical legacies and current enactments of both state and interpersonal violence, control, and containment. Care is also at the very heart (pun intended) of historical legacies and current enactments of resistance and community building.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

\u2013 Erickson, 2020<\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\nWe all need care. Care can be viewed as \u201ca species activity that includes everything we do to maintain, continue, and repair our \u2018world\u2019 so that we can live in it as well as possible. That world includes our bodies, our selves, and our environment, all of which we seek to interweave in a complex, life-sustaining web\u201d (Fisher and Toronto, 1990, p. 40). Care is not specific to disability; it\u2019s an essential part of being human and brings to light the dependencies we share with one another. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the formal healthcare system.\r\n\r\nEva Fedder Kittay\u2019s notion of the \u201cethic of care\u201d recognizes the responsibilities and obligations we have towards one another\u2019s flourishing, and includes the imperative to ensure that what care is provided can be taken up by those we care for. In other words, care must be accessible. An ethic of care is particularly important in formal healthcare settings where \u201cwe are not equally situated or empowered,\u201d such as \u201cwhen we are ill or incapacitated or faced with \u2018experts\u2019 with greater knowledge and power\u201d (Kittay, 2011, p. 55). The giving and receiving of care can be a source of dignity. At some point in our lives, we all experience a \u201crelationship of dependence\u201d (Kittay, 2011, p. 54)\r\n

\"Video\r\n

Media Moment<\/h3>\r\nTime: 12 minutes, 6 seconds<\/strong>\r\n\r\n<\/header>\r\n
\r\n\r\nTake a moment to watch the following TED Talk by Janey Starling & Seyi Falodun-Liburd. Notice how they define and practice care.\r\n\r\n[embed]https:\/\/youtu.be\/xj-alDQD2fg?si=Tz__-putnLwv1GuE[\/embed]\r\n\r\n\r\nHow collective care can change society | Janey Starling & Seyi Falodun-Liburd | TEDxLondonWomen\r\n<\/a>\r\n\r\n[h5p id=\"42\"]<\/span>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n
\"Question\r\n

Reflection Moment<\/h3>\r\n<\/header>\r\n
\r\n\r\nRespond to the following reflection questions:\r\n