Writing about institutions is no easy task. For some, institutions evoke painful memories of systemic abuse, and their closure is welcome. For others, this history inspires reform, prompting new ways of imaging institutional support. In Broken: Institutions, Families, and the Construction of Intellectual Disability, Madeline Burghardt tackles the complex legacy of institutionalization head-on, centering the lived experiences of survivors and their families while challenging received narratives of institutional history. Interweaving historical data, critical theory, and survivor accounts, Burghardt skillfully offers readers a rich monograph that is both thoughtful and provocative.
Burghardt situates her study at the Huronia Regional Centre (1876-2009), an institution for people with intellectual disabilities in Ontario, Canada. Through a series of interviews with survivors, siblings, parents, staff, and activists, Burghardt demonstrates the far-reaching impact of institutional policy, encouraging readers to consider both the experiences of those survivors who were incarcerated and the experiences of those family members who remained at home. These experiences demonstrate a range of responses. For example, many of the survivors Burghardt interviewed expressed feelings of abandonment; despite this, many did not express anger towards their parents. Rather, many siblings expressed anger on their brother's or sister's behalf. Parents, for their part, were divided. Some felt that institutionalization was a needed response to what they continue to perceive as an individual deficiency, while others felt that the absence of other support mechanisms made institutionalization their only choice. Thus, story that emerges in Broken is neither predictable nor homogenous; rather, Burghardt's research reveals a complex network of diverse and often divergent narratives of the past, each with very different policy implications for the future.
As these narratives unfold, it becomes clear that survivors' and families' responses to institutionalization are deeply tied to their sense of self. The precarity of their positionality, and the intense emotions that accompany their roles within the family unit, are largely absent from the major theoretical texts on institutionalization, notably Michael Foucault's Madness and Civilization (1961). While Broken remains in conversation with these theories, Burghardt's findings offer an exciting intervention into their conclusions. For example, her discussion of institutional abuse runs counter to Foucault's assertion that people incarcerated within institutions assume docile roles. While there is certainly ample evidence to support this claim, the lived experiences featured in Broken highlight several moments of resistance on the part of survivors, resistance that is too often erased in studies of institutional power. To some extent, Burghardt's choice to separate survivor accounts from activist accounts obscures this point, suggesting that some constituencies may shift or overlap over time; however, her analysis in the conclusion allows for a more through interrogation of these categories. Moreover, Burghardt notes that not all family members experienced institutional power in the same way. While some parents chose to bring their children to institutions, other parents had their children forcibly taken and institutionalized without their consent due to racist, sexist, and classist policies. While Foucault's work draws our attention to the subtle innerworkings of institutional systems, Burghardt emphasizes the localized impact of these systems, thereby pointing to the need to temper theoretical analysis with firsthand accounts.
To this end, Broken provides a wonderful example of how researchers might craft methodologies that center survivor knowledge. From the outset, Burghardt clearly articulates her methodology, noting the ways in which power informs the relationships amongst participants. Thus, when conflicting accounts emerge between interlocutors of different roles, as is the case in survivor and staff member accounts of institutional abuse, Burghardt remains attentive to her subjects' positionality. This attentiveness is mirrored in her structure, which begins with historical themes and moves through concentric categories of institutional affiliation, beginning with survivor accounts, then moving through siblings and parents, and concluding with staff and activist accounts. The contextual work Burghardt offers in the initial chapters provides readers with a clear lens through which to interpret the proceeding chapters. For instance, Burghardt's early work on explicating historical understandings of disability allows her to unpack parents' accounts of institutionalization. Here, she notes that parents' choice to institutionalize their child was predicated, in part, on how they defined disability, with parents who understood disability as an individual deficiency more likely to institutionalize their child. By using disability theory as critical wedge through which to interpret first person accounts, Broken asks readers to forgo individual blame, pointing instead to her early historical analysis as evidence of the ways such blame "individualizes the problem and prevents examination at the level of social responsibility" (218). The book's methodological structure challenges us to extend critical generosity to several groups simultaneously, dispelling binaries of good/bad and widening our understanding of the multiple constituencies impacted by institutional practice.
Overall, Broken: Institutions, Families, and the Construction of Intellectual Disability is a fantastic book, both in terms of its exploration of first-person accounts and its methodological approach. Burghardt writes with admirable clarity, unpacking complex concepts with concision and guiding readers through each step of the argument. As such, it is an exciting intervention into both the study of institutionalization as well as the practice of conducting ethnographic research. Broken will undoubtedly appeal to scholars, artists, and activists working in critical disability studies, critical ethnography, and qualitative research, and would serve as an excellent model for students enrolled in research methods courses. The book will also appeal to survivors and families, both those who have had contact with institutions and those who live in the shadow of their legacy. As Burghardt notes, the marginalization of survivors "did not necessarily end when institutions began to close" (220). Broken: Institutions, Families, and the Construction of Intellectual Disability is a needed invitation to center survivors in historical research, and to develop more spaces in which these accounts may continue to be shared.
