Disability and gender in the history of geographical exploration: Understanding Isabella Bird Bishop as a disabled geographer

Abstract

Studying the life and travels of the Victorian explorer Isabella Bird Bishop offers important insights into the history of disabled people within the discipline of geography. Bird Bishop is an important figure within geography's disciplinary history, as one of the first women admitted to the Royal Geographical Society in 1892. She also had a long-standing spinal condition that intermingled with psychological symptoms. In studying how her disability (and contemporary understandings of her body) shaped her travels, this paper shows how disability interacted with Bird Bishop's racial and gender identity in shaping where and how she travelled and how she wrote about her experiences. By drawing attention to the role that disability played in justifying her travels and the positive effect travel had on her health, this paper highlights her generally positive experiences of geographical travel as a disabled person.