4: Posthuman Connections: Rethinking Animal–Human Relationships

The Living Life to the Fullest Project has affirmed our interest in posthuman disability studies. This approach has enabled us to consider the promise and potential of humanist and posthuman epistemologies, theories, methodologies, interventions and activisms (Whitney et al., 2019; see Chapter 2). Whilst humanist formations are predicated upon a bounded, rational, autonomous and sovereign human subject, the posthuman condition suggests something more expansive, relational and nomadic (Liddiard et al., 2018; Braidotti and Regan, 2017). As a research team made up of disabled young co-researchers and academics, we engaged with a DisHuman approach to theory and activism (Goodley and Runswick-Cole, 2014). Our approach blends the pragmatics of humanism with posthuman possibilities. It is also open to the connections, in this case trans-species connections, that can be formed. A DisHuman approach holds in place two perspectives: the disrupting posthuman work done by disability in the world (the Dis of the DisHuman) and continued importance of embracing a humanist philosophy that recognises disabled people as fully human (the Human of DisHuman). This means we acknowledge that many disabled young people – co-researchers and participants – desire key elements of humanism: independence, autonomy and rationality. However, our engagement with their lived experiences has shown that their lived realities embody many posthuman possibilities. In this chapter, we use disabled young people’s intimate engagements with assistance dogs as an example of how the blending of animal and human incorporates the posthuman values of interdependence, mutuality and reciprocity.