Disabled people are member of society. ... html), somewhere in the world people with disabilities are living in discrimination. ... Presents and analyses the definitions of disabled people, disability (Medical or Social model)
1.1 Medical model of disability
There is no clear dividing line between disabled people and the rest of society. Disabled people in usual life have to face many issues that not only caused by their impairment but also by the way the rest of social act to them. Labeling some people as the disabled is a part of the problem of disability. People with disability face two disadvantages: physical aspects of disability and socially created limitations. Depends on which aspect that everyone focuses on when they look at disabled people, the definitions of disability disabled people change time to time.
In the year 1980, The World Health Organisation (WHO) gave a definition:
Disability: Any restriction or prevention of the performance of an activity resulting from an impairment, in the manner or within the range considered normal for human being. ... In fact, by 1980s, they questioned why disabled people should still be seen as separate and different, not eligible for open employment and unable fully to participate in everyday life because of the disadvantages shown by environment design. Such definition kept disabled people as an oppressed and powerless group. It seemed to be that WHO at that time focused on physical aspects of disable people. Sociologists call them “medical model of disability”. ... 2 Social model of disability
In 1991, Michael Oliver rejected the WHO definitions above. Instead, he preferred definitions which placed responsibility for disabled people’s problems firmly with society:
Impairment: Lacking part or all of limb, or having a defective limb, organism or mechanism of the body.
Disability: The disadvantage or restriction of activity caused by a contemporary social organization which takes no or little account of people who have physical impairments and thus excludes them from the mainstream of society (Oliver 1991, p.11)
It is easy to see that Oliver has focused on social aspects of disability. He used the term “impairment” to refer to the physical dimension and “disability” as the term which incorporates the socially created aspects.
There was also the distinction between “disability” and “impairment” in the definition of WHO. However, with both of terms “disability” and “impairment” in the consideration in the year 1980, WHO looked at disability as a situation caused by the constraints placed on people with disability by an unsympathetic society. On contrary, in the later definitions, Oliver has showed an absolute different view about disabled people. On one hand, he gave a medical model of disability which focused on the individual and physical conditions (impairments). On the other hand, “a social model of disability was given to take the focus away from the individual and look at disabling environments – ways in which society cerates disabilities. ... 301)
Agreed with Oliver and used “impairment” to refer to a medical condition, many social associations have build definitions of disability for their Aims and Objectives, for example, Liberal Democrat Disability Association (LDDA). Definition for the Association is:
“Disability is any impairment that places any person at a significant disadvantage to the average citizen. ... libdem-disability. ... uk/)
In brief, there are two model of disability: medical one and social one. The latter model holds that the disadvantages associated with disability stem primarily from the failure of the social environment, to adjust to the needs and aspirations of people with disabilities. ...
Medical models of disability concentrates on the impairment in a disabled person’s physical condition, as compared with a normal person. This then leads disabled people to be unable to perform ordinary actions, and required treatment to improve their functions. However, social rather than medical models of disability have become more important (Oliver, 1990).
The social model identifies the fact that the disability derives from social definitions of what is normal, and “it leads the world the world to be organized in ways which fit the conventional pattern of functioning” (Malcolm Payne, Social Work and Community Care, Macmillan, 1995, 153).
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