Beyond Disability
Towards an Enabling Society
Stressing the social contexts within which disabilities become apparent, the contributors highlight two key points: disabled people have practical difficulties only in the area of life affected by their disability and in other respects are no different from anyone else; and they are handicapped not by the parameters of their disability but by the demands and attitudes of society. The contributors consider the position of people with specific types of disability, explore both sides of the `care' and `counselling' equation, and discuss training, legislation and aspects of management and attitudes among professionals.
Beyond Disability has been developed as a Course Reader for the Open University course The Disabling Society (K255).
`Beyond Disability... raises questions such as why services tend to miss the needs experienced by disabled people themselves, what is it like to be disabled - and what is it like to experience different impairments such as mobility, visual or intellectual impairments. The volume includes sections on legislation (anti-discrimination), counselling, the attitudes of professionals, and concludes with a `diagnosis of the present', co-authored by one of the grand old men of the British disability movement, Vic Finkelstein.' Acta Sociologica
`Overall,the book is an insightful investigation into the perceptions and experiences, struggles, and responsiblities of a society concerned about sensitively addressing issues of disability' - Contemporary Psychology
`This text moves the disability debate onwards from blunt challenges to prevailing models of disability.... It Explains both the complexities and the practicalities of access from a vairety of perspectives.... It [the book] offers alternatives to assumptions about intervention which are profoundly challenging. I would recommend it to all readers who are interested in reflecting upon their role in the alleviation of communication disability' - Bulletin
`The value of this section [Section II] is that the authors bring out common themes from the basis of different impairments - and highlight some of the complexities which are hidden by using broad categories of disability.... This wide-ranging book provides a broad overview of disability and social responses witha balance of personal experience, policy analysis and theoretical perspectives' - Social Policy
`This book is a useful tool.... I rather like the "beyond disability" notion' - Community Care
'The second section is by far the most rewarding with the chapter [ten] on the changing perceptions of impairment in Nicaragua and its political symbolism and uses being a cross between anthropoligical study and cultural studies. It is this mix of disciplines which enables this text to rise above single discipline texts as its salience and analysis has a depth to it which is rarely achieved.... The editor's own chapter on the import of Norway's rehabilitation ideology to the unsuspecting hands of Botswana is a wonderful example of how such an analysis should work' - Disability and Society
A good read for my students who are doing disability studies in 2nd year of the social care course
A good read tackling a number of disabilities and issues.
Informative book, I would, as a visually impaired lecturer like to see a little larger print.
Some very well informed chapters,
I have recommended this to my Disability Policy Students. It is a very accessible book and as the title suggests, provides the students with a range of perspectives which go 'Beyond Disability'.
