Disability

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Disability refers to the social effects of physical or mental impairment. This definition, known as the 'social model' of disability, makes a clear distinction between the impairment itself (such as a medical condition that makes a person unable to walk) and the disabling effects of society in relation to that impairment. In simple terms, it is not the inability to walk that prevents a person entering a building unaided but the existence of stairs that are inaccessible to a wheelchair-user. In other words, 'disability' is socially constructed. The 'social model' is often contrasted with the 'medical model' which sees 'disability' as synonymous with 'impairment.'

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1 Demographics of disability
2 The language and terminology of disability
3 See also
4 References
5 External links

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Demographics of disability

Many books on disability and disability rights point out that 'disabled' is an identity that one is not necessarily born with, as disabilities are more often acquired than congenital. Some disability rights activists use an acronym TAB, Temporarily Able-Bodied, as a reminder that many will usually become disabled, either from exhaustion (physical, mental or emotional), illness, poor health or poor fitness, especially if they happen to the aged and frail stages of life.

Current issues and debates surrounding 'disability' include social and political rights, societal inclusivity and citizenship. In developed countries the debate has moved beyond a concern about the perceived cost of maintaining dependant disabled people to the struggle to find effective ways of ensuring disabled people can participate in and contribute to society in all spheres of life.

A human rights based approach has been adopted by many organisations of and for people with disabilities. In 1976, the United Nations launched its International Year for Disabled Persons (1981). Very much later (2000) the United Nations Assembly decided to start working on a comprehensive convention for the rights of people with disabilities. Since 2002 the "UN Ad-Hoc meeting" gathers every six months to discuss the content of this UN convention. These meetings are open for Non-Governmental Organisations and Disabled Peoples' Organisations.

An approach that has led to tangible improvements in the lives of people with disabilities in some regions has been the Independent Living Movement. The term "Independent Living" was taken from 1959 California legislation that enabled people disabled by polio to leave hospital wards and move back into the community with the help of cash benefits for the purchase of personal assistance with the activities of daily living. With its origins in the US civil rights and consumer movements of the late 1960s, the movement and its philosophy have since spread to other continents influencing disabled people's self-perception, their ways of organizing themselves and their countries' social policy.

The disability rights movement, led by end-users rather than families and other carers, began in the 1970s. This self-advocacy is largely responsible for the shift toward independent living and accessibility.

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The language and terminology of disability

The American Psychological Association style guide devotes a large section to the discussion of individuals with disabilities, and states that in professional writing following this style, the person should come first, and nominal forms describing the disability should be used so that the disability is being described, but is not modifying the person. For instance: people with Down syndrome, a man with schizophrenia, and a girl with paraplegia. (This applies only to English and possibly other prepositional languages, not postpositional languages.) Similarly, a person's adaptive equipment should be described functionally as something that assists a person, not as something that limits a person. "A woman who uses a wheelchair" -- she is not "in" it or "confined" to it, and she leaves it at the very least for sleeping and bathing.

Many people with disabilities have contributed to society. These include:

Self Advocate Singer-Composer Ian Dury (UK, 1942-2000)
USA president Franklin Roosevelt (impaired movement as the result of Guillain-Barré syndrome or polio),
classical composer Ludwig van Beethoven (deaf in later years),
King Richard III of England (childhood sickness allowed bones to malform, resulting in severe curvature of the back and extremely uneven legs)
musician Stevie Wonder (USA, blind)
jazz pianist Marcus Roberts (blind)
musician Ray Charles (USA, blind)
Def Leppard drummer Rick Allen (lost left arm in a car accident),
comedian, actor, author, and monologist Greg Walloch (cerebral palsy),
civil rights activist Helen Keller (deaf and blind),
Chilean civil rights activist persons with disabilities Carlos Kaiser (was born with incomplete upper and lower limbs)
Cole Porter, musical theater composer (lost legs after riding accident)
Classical actress Sarah Bernhardt (lost leg after a nasty fall)
Stephen Hawking (who has motor neurone disease and uses a wheelchair and speech synthesizer) UK,
Deng Pufang - has paraplegia
Nicaraguan guitar player, singer and songwriter Tony Melendez (born without arms)
Major league pitcher Jim Abbott (USA, born without a right hand)
Actress Marlee Matlin (deaf)
Joseph Merrick ("the Elephant Man", severe neurofibromatosis)
Christopher Reeve, USA actor famous for portraying Superman who became a quadriplegic after a horse-riding accident,
for others see list of people with disabilities.

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References

Encyclopedia of disability, general ed. Gary L. Albrecht, Thousand Oaks, Calif. [u.a.] : SAGE Publ., 2005
David Johnstone, An Introduction to Disability Studies, 2001, 2nd edition, ISBN 185346726X
Michael Oliver, The Politics of Disablement, St. Martin's Press 1997, ISBN 0333432932
Tom Shakespeare, Genetic Politics: from Eugenics to Genome, with Anne Kerr , New Clarion Press, 1999, ISBN 1873797257

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