“The social model of disability helps us recognise barriers that make life harder for Disabled people. These barriers are identified as being the physical environment, people’s attitudes, the way people communicate, how institutions and organisations are run, and how society discriminates against those of us who are perceived as ‘different’. Removing these barriers creates equality and offers Disabled people more independence, choice, and control.” Disability Rights UK (2022)
I Had learned about the social model of disability during the Inclusive Practise Unit and it made me view disability in a different way. The idea that people are not disabled, but it is the world around us that disables people a found inspiring. Although I do not have a physical disability, I do have a learning difference that I was not diagnose with until I was 22 which caused years of me feeling as though I was not clever enough and feeling very frustrated as to why I was struggling so much with my school work. My husband also suffered with a rare condition called Perthes Disease as a child, which lead him to using a wheelchair for many years and a full hip replacement as soon as his hit adulthood. Although no longer a wheelchair user, the condition has caused limitations in his mobility and seeing the struggles he can face in day to day activities makes me feel very strongly in favour of the social model of Disability. By identifying the barriers in the world around us that can prevent those with disabilities from being included, and finding ways to bring those barriers down to create a more inclusive society. As stated by Gomes.,et al “One important step in improving accessibility is bringing awareness of diversity and inclusion within our own society.” (2020)
I’ve always strived to make my teaching as inclusive as possible. During Covid I developed LCF Tech pages to guide students through technical workshops that they needed to do from home. Understanding that students have different ways of learning, I gave students options from videos guides, text and diagrams that were translatable and having an Immersive reader function. It is only since the move that I realised that I had not considered physical impairments and how we may have barriers on this course that could inhibit students with physical disabilities from thriving. It is my hope with this Action Research project that I can identify barriers within the BA and MA costume courses and start to find solutions for these in order to bring them down.
“By Identifying social barriers which should be removed, the social model has been effective instrumentally in the liberation of disabled people.” Shakespeare,(2006: 198)
Since I have been a technician at LCF, we have not had a student that is a wheelchair user, This is probably down to the fact that we were located on the first floor at Lime Grove without a lift. However now with the move to Eastbank and being in an accessible building, we can hope to expect that students who are wheelchair users may now apply. I plan to walk around the spaces we have and see what potential barriers we currently have.
References
Disability Rights UK (2022) Social Model of disability: Language. Available at https://www.disabilityrightsuk.org/social-model-disability-language Accessed 20th November 2023
Gomes, K.M., Nguyen, T., Stonewall, J., Davis, K., Coppola, S., Hallett, K. and Williams, R.M., (2020) December. Inclusion and Accessibility in The Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting Sage CA: Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications available at https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Kermit-Davis/publication/349283531_Inclusion_and_Accessibility_in_The_Human_Factors_and_Ergonomics_Society/links/6036c6b4299bf1cc26ebefb9/Inclusion-and-Accessibility-in-The-Human-Factors-and-Ergonomics-Society.pdf [Accessed] 26th October 2023
UAL (2023) Disability services: Our Values. Available at https://www.arts.ac.uk/__data/assets/pdf_file/0029/28829/Disability-Service-Values-PDF-1080-KB.pdf Accessed 20th November 2023
Shakespeare, T (2006) The social model of disability. The disability studies reader, 2, pp.197-204. Available at https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=aiQlDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA195&ots=TCwo90Izu2&dq=By%20Identifying%20social%20barriers%20which%20should%20be%20removed%2C%20the%20social%20model%20has%20been%20effective%20instrumentally%20in%20the%20liberation%20of%20disabled%20people&lr&pg=PA199#v=onepage&q=By%20Identifying%20social%20barriers%20which%20should%20be%20removed,%20the%20social%20model%20has%20been%20effective%20instrumentally%20in%20the%20liberation%20of%20disabled%20people&f=false [Accessed] 19th November 2023.