The Relationship of Identity to Disability

Impairment: limitation, loss or difference of functioning mind or body which only becomes a disability when it preevents normal everyday activities

Disability: when impairments prevent normal everyday activities

Barnes (1998) suggested stereotypes of disability, particularly those generated by media include

• less than human
• monsters or wicked people (labelling)
• unable to contribute to society

These lead to a stigmatized identity, which then leads to exclusion from full participation in society

Social model views on disability focus on:

• economic/environmental/ cultural barriers
• inadequate disability benefits
• inaccesable to education, work, houses, traansport,publlic buildings

Medical model views on disaility focus on:

Disabled people are typically given negative media stereotypes e.g villains in films (James Bond) usually display physical disabilities.

Although this is the case, it is improving as events such as the paralympics are becoming increasingly popular and normalised instead of being rejected by society.

Steven Hawking is labelled as one of the cleverest men alive and there is shows such as undateales that specially cater to helping disabled people find love.

Marxism- marxists may see disabled people as burdens to society as they don't follow the ruling class ideology, they might not be able to work, therefore they wont be contributing to society.