Blog
Am I disabled or do I have a disability? & International Day for Persons with Disabilities
Hello! my name’s Patrick Sholl and I’m your newly elected Disability Officer. Wednesday week 8 (today in fact) is International Day for Persons with Disabilities. If I’d had a bit more time to prepare I would have liked to organise something proper for this day but sadly you’re going to have to put up with a stream of consciousness instead.
Something that struck me as interesting when I heard about this day is that the name has changed this year from being ‘International Day for Disabled Persons’. This change in name reflects the fact that knowing what’s best or politically correct to call someone with a disability is controversial and seemingly ever changing. Despite growing up with a disability of my own and around family members with disabilities, I’ve found my own idea of what the correct terminology is has been challenged recently, especially with further research since I became Disability Officer. I always spoke about myself, and about others, as ‘having a disability’ rather than ‘being disabled’. This seemed logical to me as to say as it suggests that disability doesn’t define a person. To say ‘I’m disabled’ seems like it’s an essential property of me. To say ‘I have a disability’ suggests that it is just one aspect of me that is non-definitional.
However, on some readings of the social model of disability, including the one adopted by the NUS, this is incorrect. The social model is relatively uncontroversial and asserts that many problems people face from disability are down to social expectations and situations. This contrasts with the medical model of disability that suggests that all problems are down to the individual’s lack of ability, that is it’s intrinsic to the individual. It is common practice to attempt to capture this distinction by contrasting the meanings of impairment and disability. ‘Impairment’ is used to refer to the physiological or psychological differences from the norm or ideal that people with disabilities (as understood conventionally) have, but ‘disability’ is used to refer to what occurs if society fails to accommodate their needs. In this sense, people with impairments may well be disabled, but they are disabled by society, not by their impairment itself. Which is why it’s better to say a ‘disabled person’ than ‘a person with a disability’ as saying the latter suggests it’s a feature of the person themselves, not the social setting.
While this distinction seems accurate the terminology doesn’t seem right to me. When people normally talk of someone being disabled, they don’t mean disabled by society, they mean that they themselves are disabled. They have a disability, not because societies expectations have imposed it on them but because of their own defect, and further, by calling someone disabled it seems to me you are saying it is a key aspect of them.
So while I see what people are trying to do on both sides I will, for now, stick to talking about ‘people with disabilities’ as opposed to ‘disabled people’, unless someone can convince me otherwise. Given the change of the name of the day it seems perhaps that the UN General Assembly agrees with me, although I haven’t found any solid explanation for the change of name. Despite all this debate about which is better, what seems most important to me is just to have given it some thought. As long as you’re being consciousness, and trying not to offend, whatever you call people with disabilities is fine. Just try and be sensitive to what different individuals find offensive. Anyway that’s my little rant over, I hope it wasn’t too dull. Thanks for reading!
Some useful links:
- Disability Services guidelines for tutors, which are useful for knowing what you are entitled to and what should be expected of academic staff.
- Ouch! - the BBC’s disability website. Some interesting articles can be found there from time to time.
And don’t forget that you can contact me at disability@yusu.org if you have any problems, comments, or suggestions. Thanks!
