Oscar Pistorius

Oscar Pistorius Forges New Workplace Culture [video]

Haig Chahinian

Describe the culture of your workplace.

Can you even?

It’s not  easy to pinpoint, since workplace culture typically comprises unconscious assumptions shared by the people involved.

Not easy, unless you’re sportswriter Michael Sokolove, who recently wrote about Oscar Pistorius, the top-ranked 400-meter runner and 2012 London Olympics hopeful.

Pistorius runs with extraordinary athletic ability, and uses prostheses called Flex-Foot Cheetas because he was born without the fibula bone in either of his legs.  Sokolove wrote in The New York Times Magazine about the ways Pistorius is forging a new culture on the track field, and more generally in competitive athletics.  Sokolove talked to a colleague about his experience following Pistorius. In the interview, he says:

In my mind, there is an image of an Olympic-level runner. He is a human thoroughbred, powerful and graceful, like Michael Johnson, the world-record holder in the 400 meters. Oscar is certainly powerful, and graceful in his own way, but I could not look at him and say: this is the highest order of the human form. You can’t. There’s something missing. So I had to adjust my mind and say: this is also a runner, possibly an Olympian, and regard him on his own terms.

Sokolove speaks for so many when he describes this mental image of an Olympic runner, which is laden with assumptions about gender, physical looks, age, as well as ability. These are some of the intangible components of the culture of competitive sports, which Pistorius continues to challenge.

How? Read more →

The Beauty of Different Abilities

Haig Chahinian

Of all the terms that emerged in the 1990s to describe various reference groups in “politically correct” ways, the one we still use is “differently abled,” meant to describe people who need accommodation such as a wheelchair to manage certain physical tasks.

When we think about it more closely, though, aren’t we all differently abled, since no two people have the exact same abilities?

Case in point: Oscar Pistorius, the sprinter from South Africa who’s gunning to compete in the 2012 Olympics. Yes, the Olympic Games, to be held next summer in London, even though Pistorius runs using prosthetics that look like blades. His legs were amputated below the knee when he was an infant, as he was born without the fibula in his lower legs.

Featured recently in the New York Times, not only is he campaigning to race against men without prostheses or other accommodation, he’s now modeling for Thierry Mugler. Do check out these photos where his full hunkitude is on display.

In Pistorius’s own words, from the Times article:

“When people see something that has a stereotype of not being perfect, or that we think is a bit taboo to discuss, it just catches them off guard,” Mr. Pistorius said, “especially in a context where they are so used to seeing what we as human beings deem as perfection.”

We’re in awe of Pistorius’s determination to do exactly what he wills.

Now, what were those challenges you were griping about earlier today? Which of your different abilities can you use to negotiate the obstacles?

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