Cheryl Marie Wade (1948-2013) was a performance artist and poet who used her work to explore previously taboo subjects related to disabilities in bold, proud and unsparing terms.
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Hello, I’m Grace Lynch, a producer and host with Wonder Media Network. Today, I have the distinct honor of guest hosting for this episode of Encyclopedia Womannica.
Our local legend of the day is the self-described “queen mother of gnarly”. A performance artist and poet, she used her work to explore previously taboo subjects related to disabilities in bold, proud and unsparing terms.
Much of our story today takes place at the University of California, Berkeley. As a Berkeley alum and former Bay-Area performer myself, I felt particularly inspired by today’s story.
Let’s talk about the remarkable Cheryl Marie Wade.
Cheryl was born in Vallejo, California on March 4, 1948. Her homelife was full of hardship. Money was tight in the family and both Cheryl’s mother and father developed drinking problems. Cheryl also reported being sexually abused by her father throughout her childhood.
At age 10, Cheryl started to develop rheumatoid arthritis. Rheumatoid Arthritis is a chronic inflammatory disorder. The body attacks its own tissue, usually focusing around the joints, hands and feet, creating painful swelling. In severe cases, like Cheryl’s, it can lead to joint deformity.
By age 16, Cheryl was using a wheelchair full time. After graduating from high school she enrolled in the College of Marin in Marin County, California, but had to drop out due to immense physical pain. As a result, Cheryl entered into a dark period of isolation and depression for the better part of a decade.
But her fortunes began to turn when a doctor introduced her to an electric wheelchair. Reflecting back, Cheryl said the chair changed her life and in 1974, she re-enrolled in the College of Marin. She soon found a thriving community of students with disabilities and became the president of the Disabled Students Union.
As she neared graduation, she learned of a resident program with the University of California, Berkeley (go bears!) that would give her the support and resources needed to live on her own -- something Cheryl had never been able to do.
She enrolled, and earned a masters degree in psychology. During her time at Berkeley, Cheryl began writing short stories, poems and essays, but didn’t focus on her experience living with disabilities. That changed in 1985 when a friend brought her to a meeting of the ‘Wry Crips’ a Berkeley writing and performance group for women with disabilities.
Of her experience with the Wry Crips, Cheryl said, “what was fabulous about it, was the feeling of being free to have a voice as a cripple woman, being free to sort of experiment with what I wanted to say about it, because I had no thoughts of saying anything about it until I joined them.”
In addition to essays and poems, Cheryl began writing performance pieces that addressed her relationship with disabilities. She founded a dance troupe of artists with disabilities called “Axis.” Her one-woman show, “Sassy Girl: Memoirs of a Poster Child Gone Awry” toured for many years around the Bay Area and beyond.
She was pioneering in her use of videos to discuss disability rights, creating award-winning short films like Here, Body Talk and Disability Culture Rap. Her poetry and writings were published in outlets like New Mobility, The Disability Rag and Ms. Magazine.
Cheryl’s artistic pieces received widespread recognition for their boldness and unapologetic approach to combating stereotypes. One of her collaborators, Judith Smith, said Cheryl, “embodied and modeled disability pride before it was a thing.”
In the late 1990s, Cheryl became a vocal opponent of the “death with dignity” movement, sometimes referred to as doctor-assisted suicide. She wrote an essay for Electric Edge, the online edition of the disability journal Ragged Edge, arguing that the movement was based on the idea that only ‘perfect’ bodies were worthy bodies. Cheryl believed the movement was a negative reaction to the increased visibility and integration of the disabled community in mainstream culture.
Cheryl suggested that rather than live in the presence of disabled people, society had devised a new sanitized way of disposing of them. She said, “And because there is no way for good people to admit just how bloody uncomfortable they are with us, they distance themselves from their fears by devising new ways to erase us from the human landscape.”
Due to complications with her rheumatoid arthritis, Cheryl passed away in 2013 in Berkeley, California. She was 63 years old.
Cheryl is remembered as a compelling writer and performer, who used her considerable talents to bring pride and awareness to the disability community.
Tune in tomorrow for the story of our final Local Legend.
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Talk to you tomorrow!