Historical Depictions Of Disability Essay

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Introduction Disability is identified as being a deviant from the norm (Clapton and Fitzgerald, 2004). This is a social constructed rationale of difference has come about “when a person differs from dominant social norms on a particular dimension, and is negatively evaluated by others” (Jahoda and Markova, 2004, p.1). Disability history has many diverse aspects to it. Therefore, this essay will focus primarily on how the difference of body has been documented throughout history. The essay will firstly review the early depictions of disability. It will continue by examining the historic records of disability from a Western Civilization perspective and will finally conclude with evaluating the recent disability history. Early Historic Depictions of Disability Early accounts of impaired …show more content…

Early Christian beliefs after Jesus’ time began to perceive that disability was not an actually “punishment for sin but, on the contrary, a means of purification and a way of grace.” (Baker et al. 1953). Although throughout the Middle Ages not only were the early Christian beliefs also accepted about disability regardless body differences were perceived “as the result of evil spirits, the devil, witchcraft or God’s displeasure (Clapton and Fitzgerald, 2004). Early historic depictions of disability are extremely paradoxical and historic accounts have depicted disability and difference of body to be perceived in an apprehensive context while also being benevolent to those impaired. However, impaired people did, to some extent, engage into society but not in an equality capacity (Braddock and Parish, 2001, p. 17). Additional, it is important to note that the life experiences of impaired people in early historic depictions are not writing from their perspectives of living but “with a specific social context and as reflecting specific social interests” (Cameron, 2014, p.

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