Evolving Narratives of Gulf Press Representations of Women with Disabilities

People with disabilities make up 16% of the world's population, an estimated 1.3 billion individuals. Because many people rely on the media to make sense of the world, a skewed perception of people with disabilities has become dominant in society today. People with disabilities are largely depicted in the media as deserving of pity and charity and always dependent on others for survival. The media provides us with narratives that we use to create interpretations of the world around us and, consequently, become bases of norms and attitudes about issues and persons around us. This paper studies Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries’ news coverage of women with disabilities to gain insights into the kind of narratives the Gulf press constructs about them. Through a content analysis of national news agencies’ news reports from Bahrain, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), this study reveals how Gulf media contributes to the consolidation of or liberation from established notions and perceptions about women with disabilities in Gulf society.