Хоризонти на живота с интелектуални увреждания в България: личен опит и родителски наративи
Horizons of Life with Intellectual Disabilities in Bulgaria: Personal Experience and Parental Narratives

Summary/Abstract: This article explores perceptions of the future among people with intellectual disabilities in Bulgaria through the dual perspective of their personal narratives and parental accounts. The analysis draws on biographical interviews, focus groups, and participant observation conducted between 2016 and 2024. The theoretical framework combines disability studies, the concepts of crip time and alternative temporalities, and the ethics of care. The article examines how parental visions of the future are situated between fear and hope, and between support for their children’s autonomy, on the one hand, and paternalism, on the other. At the same time, the narratives of young people with intellectual disabilities reveal their experiences of stigmatization, their complex dependencies on parental care, and the scenes of a desired future in which they situate their understandings of themselves and their place in the world. Particular attention is paid to the limitations of the Bulgarian social welfare and healthcare systems, as well as to the tensions between “normal” and alternative conceptions of the “good life”. The analysis identifies different horizons of the future – normative, activist, and symbiotic – and highlights convergences and divergences between parental expectations and the aspirations of young people with intellectual disabilities regarding work, friendships and intimate relationships, mobility, and participation in community life.

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