scholarly journals An Overview of Current Library Support for Readers with Special Needs

2004 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-56
Author(s):  
Katherine Read

The Social Model of Disability sees “disabled people disabled by physical, organisational and/or attitudinal/behavioural barriers in society. For instance it is not an inability to climb stairs that excludes wheelchair users from accessing the different floors of a library but the fact that a lift or ramp is not provided in the first place” (Jones, 2002)

Author(s):  
Michał Skóra ◽  

Disability is one of the greatest problems of modern society. It is a multidimensional phenomenon, as evidenced by numerous classifications and definitions of disability, created by representatives of various fields of science. The medical and social model of disability is adopted in the literature. Analyzing legal regulations, it should be stated that the social model of disability prevails, i.e. limitations concerning disabled people and their ability to function in society. The author describes the definition of disability on the basis of national legislation.


2020 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Author(s):  
Sean Aas

The social model of disability claims that disadvantage from disability is primarily a result of the social response to bodily difference. Social modellers typically draw two normative conclusions: first, that society has a responsibility to address disability disadvantage as a matter of justice, not charity; second, that the appropriate way of addressing this disadvantage is to change social institutions themselves, to better fit for bodily difference, rather than to normalize bodies to fit existing institutions. This paper offers a qualified defense of both inferences. Social institutions have reasons of justice to fix disability disadvantage, because the choice of institutions that contingently favor those whose bodies are statistically typical incurs responsibilities to compensate those who disfavored, in that choice. Among other things, this responsibility implies that societies should not simultaneously materially disadvantage disabled people, and also withhold symbolic resources, by demanding a presumption in favor of personal transformation – thereby, undermining the social conditions for disability pride.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rannveig Svendby ◽  
Grace Inga Romsland ◽  
Kåre Moen

This article describes situations where preconceptions about disabled people were made apparent in a non-disabled researcher’s thoughts, words and actions in the course of fieldwork for a qualitative study into the lives of disabled young adults. The article uses these experiences as entry points to discovery and analysis of cultural ableism. It draws on critical theory and insights from the social model of disability, and takes an autoethnographic approach to highlight the researcher’s preconceptions and her process towards a more nuanced understanding of disability.


1996 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Judith Craddock

Since the 1960s, people with disabilities have been developing their own perspective on what it means to be disabled. At the vanguard of this development was the independent living movement which, with other organisations of disabled people, identified disabled people as a group experiencing a particular oppression, disabled by social processes and handicapped by society's lack of commitment to the creation of enabling environments. Part 1 of this article examines the genesis and development of the disability movement. The ideas and analysis that the disability movement has generated and its critique of the medical model of disability are outlined, and its impact — both ideological and legislative — is reviewed. The changing professional philosophy of occupational therapy is described and the impact on it of changing social values is assessed. Part 2 will review the explicit responses of the occupational therapy profession to the disability movement. The validity of the social model of disability for occupational therapy interventions will be considered and an analysis will be presented of the implications for the profession's philosophy and practice of the adoption of the social model of disability in appropriate areas of practice.


Author(s):  
Jeremiah M. Moruri ◽  
Naftali K. Rop ◽  
Ruth J. Choge

Mainstreaming is a concept and practice of educating learners with challenges in regular education settings. Mainstreaming advocates for education of all categories of learners without discriminating the specific group of individuals with disabilities. The study sought to assess strategies used by teachers in readiness for mainstreaming of learners with special needs in public primary schools in Masaba South Sub County, Kisii County, Kenya. The study was underpinned by the Social Model of Disability theory. Simple random sampling was used to select a sample of 234 teachers while purposive sampling was used to select the 25 headteachers from the schools which were used in the study. Questionnaires were employed for data collection. A pilot study was carried out in one of the schools within the study area. The study adopted survey research design to investigate the study variables. Both qualitative and quantitative approaches were used in analyzing data. The findings of the study found out that teachers’ attitude, professional development and experience influence mainstreaming. The study also observed that for mainstreaming to be achieved, the curriculum needs to be structured, teachers should be trained in special needs education, and the school environment should meet the needs of learners with special needs. It is recommendable that the government and all education stakeholders should jointly enhance expansion of facilities in the already established schools. This will encourage all teachers, trained or not to be ready to handle all categories of learners in the mainstream settings in Masaba South Sub County.


Author(s):  
Chris Gilleard ◽  
Paul Higgs

This chapter highlights the importance of bodily impairment and infirmity in creating social divisions in later life. It begins with a consideration of what constitutes disability and impairment. It examines such distinctions and divisions in the light of the social model of disability and the distinction between ageing with disability and ageing into disability. While the former draws more easily upon the social model, the social identification with disability is more difficult for those whose adult lives have placed them in the position of being able-bodied adults. The confounding of age and disability represents not simply a social divide, but a divide within the person. While policies designed to serve older people as former workers who have become pensioners to some degree protects the financial interests of older disabled people, the absence of community framed by disability risks a greater social exclusion. The rise of policies designed both to encourage older people to be responsible for the success of their own ageing and to more strictly delineate distinctions (and entitlements) between the frail and the non-frail has sharpened this division. The difficulties are highlighted of aligning a social model of disability and the common interests of disabled people with a model based on frailty as an intersectional location fashioned around age disadvantage and disablement.


Author(s):  
O. Polumysna

Polumysna O. Defining the status “person with a disability” in UkraineThe article finds that the term “person with a disability” has constantly evolved, the attitude of society towards a person with a disability has been constantly changing. The nicknames that society assigned to this category of people, calling them lame, idiots, beggars, lunatics, social outsiders, the mentally retarded, the retarded, scarecrows for the healthy, samovars, etc. are considered. It was found that these names indicated only a person's disability or position in society and did not identify him as an ordinary person with his own needs and problems to be solved. In the twentieth century, only how able / incapable a person is came to the fore. At the end of the XX – beginning of the XXI century in many countries society began to pay attention not only to the medical indications of people with disabilities, but began to talk about the equality of these people in society, i.e. the implementation of the social model of disability. It is noted that the use of the words in-valid, dis-ability, mal-formation already fosters in society a negative attitude towards people with disabilities. It has been studied that the vast majority of researchers called people with disabilities “people with disabilities”, “people with special needs”, “people with disabilities”. In addition, there are sharper statements such as “abnormal student with disabilities”, “child with defects”, “special child”. After the law was passed in 2017, most scholars began using the term “person with a disability”. It was found that people with disabilities living in Ukraine ask not to be called autistic, cerebral palsy, downs, people with special needs, disabilities, and put a person first, and then his disability. There has been and in fact there is no consensus between society, scientists and people with disabilities themselves, as they are called, which indicates a certain imbalance and lack or one-sided communication in society.


2005 ◽  
Vol 19 (3) ◽  
pp. 527-545 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin Barnes ◽  
Geof Mercer

This article engages with debates relating to social policy and disabled people’s exclusion from the British labour market. Drawing on recent developments from within the disabled people’s movement, in particular, the concept of independent living and the social model of disability, and the associated disability studies literature, a critical evaluation of orthodox sociological theories of work, unemployment, and under-employment in relation to disabled people’s exclusion from the workplace is provided. It is argued that hitherto, analyses of work and disability have failed to address in sufficient depth or breadth the various social and environmental barriers that confront disabled people. It is suggested therefore that a reconfiguration of the meaning of work for disabled people - drawing on and commensurate with disabled people’s perspectives as expressed by the philosophy of independent living - and a social model analysis of their oppression is needed and long overdue.


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