The Social Construction Of Disability Essay

In “Ableism” by Carmelita (Rosie) Castaneda, Larissa E. Hopkins, and Madeline L. Peters, they define “ableism or disability oppression [as] a term used to describe the all encompassing system of discrimination and exclusion of people living with disabilities” (Castaneda, Hopkins, Peters 462). Historically, people with disabilities have not been accepted by society, to participate or be seen by the masses of people of able-bodied. Castaneda, Hopkins, Peters write that people with disabilities were constantly treated as others. There were policies and actions that separated people woth disabilities from temporarily able-bodied people. People with disabilities were placed in asylums, in freak shows, and during the Euginics movement, killed. Then, acoording to Castaneda, Hopkins, Peters, despite the shift from …show more content…
According to Wendell, “disability is relative to a person’s physical, social, and cultural environment, none of the resulting physical conditions is necessarily disabling, many do in fact cause disability given the demands and lack of support in the environments of the people affected (481). She related the way in which someone is disabled to the ways in which the environment or physical world, is accessible to them. Wendell writes that the environment with which we live in, is catered to an able-bodied person. This creates the mindset that everyone is able-bodied. This becomes the social norm, and everyone that deviates from this socially constructed norm is disabled. Wendell then notes that failure to change the physical world to be more widely accessible to all, creates more disability. She then writes that culture also plays a role in created disability. This is in how different cultures have certain expectations or views on certain groups. When these groups fail to meet these certain expectations, they are labeled disabled or