It bothered me that there were no Squibs allowed in Hogwarts. Fine, I can get that Squibs would not be able to do any wand magic, and would not be able to fly a broomstick. They still apparently possess enough innate magic to see the school and other magically hidden locations. Out of the classes at Hogwarts that the kids take, a Squib could take and benefit from the following classes: History of Magic, Astronomy, Divination, Care of Magical Creatures, Herbology, MUGGLE STUDIES, Potions (there will be little foolish wand-waving here), Arithmancy, Ancient Runes, and partially theoretical classes on Defense Against the Dark Arts and Charms.
That’s a long list of classes. And some of them are particularly upsetting to me because there’s stuff like History of Magic being left out- that’s their own history they’re being barred from learning. Since Squibs are often forced into the Muggle world, a Squib would make an ideal Muggle Studies teacher and would no doubt be able to teach a more realistic and informative class than someone going off of biased wizarding texts. Squib kids looking into living in the Muggle world would absolutely benefit from learning Muggle studies, especially if they’re from a mainly pureblood family who doesn’t venture out all too often.
And then there’s the rest of them! Arguably you could have a Squib gifted with prescience, and Divination is supposed to be a very accessible branch of magic. Squibs being excellent at taking care of magical plants and animals and making groundbreaking advancements, Squibs working in tandem with each other to breed different magical herbs for potions, Squib potion masters creating all sorts of amazing concoctions. Squibs working with muggleborns and using logic and science to advance magic theoretically, Squibs being huge pro-muggleborn/pro-muggle advocates, Squibs making star charts and Squibs going into the muggle world to use their healing potions in their jobs as nurses and doctors.
Squibs being so completely shut out of magical education was such a sore point for me in the books, especially viewing the treatment of our only prominent Squib- an angry, bitter, glorified janitor often at the mercy of brats with wands. I’m not justifying or endorsing his abusiveness at all, but this was an awful character to use to explore people without magic in a society that bases your worth on it. A lot of time Rowling seems to validate Wizarding prejudices more than she challenges them. While I really enjoy reading the headcanons about Hogwarts being very accessible to people with disabilities, I can’t bring myself to see that as the case with Squibs being treated as they are.
There was a quote from Rowling about how she was conflicted about how to treat people with disabilities in HP when magic cures things, and I felt like screaming SQUIBS ARE DISABLED BASED ON YOUR LAWS OF YOUR UNIVERSE, and how you JK Rowling are treating them is SHITTY.
this is so true omg. from the harry potter wiki:
“Even families that are tolerant of Muggles and Muggle-borns seem to regard Squibs poorly. For example, the Weasley family seems embarrassed to have a Squib who works in the Muggle world as an accountant in the family. Also, many wizarding families are anxious to see early signs of magical ability and are upset by the prospect that a member might be a Squib.”
“The term likely comes from the English expression “a damp squib” (dud firecracker), an expected delight that disappoints.”
this sounds exactly like the shitty narratives written by non disabled parents of disabled children :///////
For all of you who are reblogging this, I highly suggest reading Leigh A. Neithardt’s “’Spinched’: The Problem of Disability in the Harry Potter Series” in Critical Insights: The Harry Potter Series (I can’t find a version of the essay accessible online, sorry). Neithardt goes into a couple of the disability issues in the series, and one of the characters specifically examined is Filch:
“Filch is pained by having to admit that he is a Squib. Even though readers, like Harry, do not know what one is, they likely guess that it is something negative. Filch believes that it is the reason for the cruelty inflicted on Mrs. Norris. Ron’s amusement at Filch’s condition demonstrates an immaturity that actual people may have when discussing someone’s disability. Likewise, Ron’s assumption that Filch is bitter is akin to the assumption that people without disabilities may make about those who have them – that the wish they were like “everyone else,” and are bitter toward those who are “normal.” … Rowling doesn’t just “make him” a Squib, however. She makes him despised by most of the students. She then has Ron attribute bitterness and, perhaps, jealousy to Filch because of his disability… the only substantive pieces of information [readers] get about him are that he has a disability and a nasty temper.” (279-280)
JKR has actually also stated that Squibs are unable to make potions, since apparently wands are involved (I had a discussion on a confession about the variety of things that Squibs could do, and the 2006 Rowling interview comment came up. Of course, if you want to assume Death of the Author as your viewpoint, then the books really don’t ever show wands as being necessary for potions, but if you’re taking into account interviews/extended canon then that rules the practical aspect of potions out.
OTOH, there’s still a ton that Squibs can do (and I’m just going to copypasta my thoughts from the other discussion here, original post here if you want to see the Rowling interview comment.)
Given that wands are apparently necessary for Potions, I’d assume a similar requirement for Herbology, or possibly an implied (but not ever really seen in the books) requirement that you would need magic to successfully work with the plants, at least the more dangerous varieties – you might be able to handle something like Devil’s Snare with a lighter and some ingenuity instead of magic, but possibly there are plants that require actual spells rather than Muggle substitutes. (Even so, I’d assume that the theory and at least some of the subject matter would be within reach.)
However, I still don’t think that there’s a good reason for excluding Squibs from Hogwarts: you could have a curriculum for Squibs, given that there are plenty of jobs in the Wizarding World that don’t require use of magic. A Squib at Hogwarts should be able to take Astronomy, History of Magic, Muggle Studies, Ancient Runes, possibly Arithmancy (JKR hasn’t really developed this enough as a subject for us to know what it entails), and perhaps some abbreviated form of Care of Magical Creatures and Herbology. (They couldn’t, say, use a Severing Charm to remove a Crup tail, but they could observe unicorns, flobberworms, and help feed skrewts and whatnot. NEWT-level ComC might be out if magic is required around more dangerous creatures like hippogriffs, but OWL level ComC seems like it’s within reach.) They would also be able to study the theoretical portion of the magic-based subjects (Charms, Transfiguration, Potions, etc.), though I think it could be incredibly frustrating to learn all the theory and never be able to apply it.
But there are plenty of jobs in the Wizarding World that don’t need magic or that could be done by Squibs with the proper OWLs. How much magic does a Ministry bureaucrat need on a daily basis – you can’t be an Unspeakable or on the Committee for Experimental Charms or an Auror, but what magic do you need to work in the Department of Magical Sports or the Department of International Magical Cooperation? A Squib could easily serve as Minister for Magic – how much magic does Cornelius Fudge actually have to use?
A Squib could easily be a shopkeeper in Diagon Alley – not necessarily someone who has to deal with biting books or magical remedies, but, say, the owner of an ice cream shop or the Leaky Cauldron? (Heck, given that wizards don’t seem to generally have contact with Muggles but have to get their groceries somewhere, how about being a wizard grocer?)
Outside the realms of Ministry and small business (which do seem to be the two largest sources of magical careers), you could learn languages like Mermish or Gobbledygook and work as a translator, or serve as a liaison between Muggle-borns and the Wizarding World, or be an author writing books about any number of subjects (or fiction!), or be an actor and attend WADA (the Wizarding Academy for the Dramatic Arts, mentioned in Beedle the Bard.) You could use a NEWT in Ancient Runes to translate ancient works or be a magical archaeologist, or perhaps work on Arithmancy tables, or be an anthropologist and engage in comparisons between the Wizarding and Muggle worlds. You could be a reporter and publish articles in the Prophet – you might not be able to play Quidditch, but you could report on it. And assuming that the only difference between magical and non-magical photography is the developing potion, you could become a photographer and have someone else brew the potion to develop your prints. (With some help from full-fledged wizards, Squibs could expand their abilities even further – treat it like a disability that needs reasonable accommodation instead of something that warrants being cast out of the magical world, and the list of careers would widen.)
I mean, you’d certainly have to modify the curriculum, and many subjects that are Hogwarts electives would become Squib core curricula, but it definitely seems like there’s more of a role for Squibs in the Wizarding world than wizards generally allow – in-universe, you could say that cultural prejudice keeps them from being allowed these roles, but I’d definitely say it’s an area that should be ripe for activism.
(Of course, there’s another interesting aspect of things: pure-bloods in particular pride themselves on their magical ability and believes it makes them superior, and in-book being a Squib or having a Squib in the family is a source of shame, so the prospect of Squibs attending Hogwarts and surpassing fully magical students in certain subjects would be fairly major. Not to mention that Squibs are essentially Muggles raised in wizarding families – remove the stigma from being a Squib, and it removes anti-Muggle prejudice, which would further undermine the establishment. Look at how much emphasis is placed on having a wand, using a wand, etc., in DH – there’s a whole aspect here that I’m just touching upon, the idea that’s so ingrained in Wizarding society that wand-users are superior and that only people with the power to use a wand are truly citizens of the Wizarding world. Imagine a Hogwarts where wand-using witches and wizards, non-wand-using Squibs, and wand-using goblins/centaurs/non-humans could all attend, with different classes and different areas of study. That would make for a fairly radical shift in Wizarding society, no?)
Speaking of reasonable accommodations, magic items are shown to be fairly easy to make (with durability being one of the only issues). Surely for classes that require very limited use of magic you could give them a magic item that replicates that specific spell?
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A Glitch Named Anti 