Gendered ageism and dis/abl(e)ism

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Messages in get well cards

Several stereotypes are portrayed through get well cards.

A couple of examples from Etsy can be found underneath. Often these stereotypes come with a narrative that one should ‘get back to normal’, not ‘be lazy’, be a ‘burden’, and that one should ‘get well’. This also underlines what Susan Wendell refers to as the main goal when sick “Get well or die”, what she refers to as the harsher version of the first commandment of sickness as described by Robert Murphy: to get well (see discussion on p. 105, Wendell, 1996).

(NB: this does not mean that all cards portray these messages, we are just showing some examples where they are)