https://doi.org/10.67147/literariness.v1i4.076
Beyond the Brain Matrix: Mapping Ableism, Neurological Divergence, and the Poetics of Cognitive Difference in the Movie Hichki
MS. SUSAN T SUSHIL
Assistant Professor
PG and Research Dept. of English, St. Thomas College, Kozhencherry, Kerala
Email: sushiltthomas@gmail.com
RIYA RENJI MATHEW
Student, Bachelor of Education (English),
Mar Thoma Teachers’ Training College, Edakulam, Ranni, Kerala
Email: riyarenjimathew982002@gmail.com
Abstract: Contemporary disability studies increasingly advocate a shift from viewing bodily and neurological differences as deficits toward recognizing them as diverse forms of human embodiment. This paper examines Siddharth P. Malhotra’s 2018 Hindi film Hichki through the interdisciplinary framework of Health Humanities, drawing on ableism, embodiment, neurological difference, and humanistic approaches to care and education. The film follows Naina Mathur, an aspiring teacher with Tourette syndrome, whose involuntary motor and vocal tics lead to social ridicule and institutional discrimination. By placing a woman with a neurological condition at the centre of its narrative, Hichki challenges representations of disability that reduce disabled individuals to passive recipients of care.
Naina’s repeated rejection by educational institutions exposes ableist assumptions and demonstrates how neurological difference is shaped by social responses to visible and audible bodily differences. From a Health Humanities perspective, the film foregrounds the lived, emotional, relational, and social dimensions of Tourette syndrome while also inviting a neuroscientific understanding of the condition. Naina’s transformation of her perceived weakness into a pedagogical strength further challenges conventional notions of normalcy. Her adaptive teaching practices, particularly with marginalized students in class 9F, create an inclusive classroom that accommodates diverse bodies, minds, and learning modes. This paper argues that Hichki locates exclusion not simply in neurological difference but in the social meanings attached to it. By integrating disability, neuroscience, narrative experience, and humanistic care, the film reimagines neurological difference as embodied diversity and advocates movement from normalization toward empathy, accommodation, and inclusive education.
Keywords: Health Humanities, Disability, Tourette Syndrome, Neuroscience, Ableism, Embodiment, Neurological Difference, Inclusive Education
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