Disability Equity A South African Perspective 5

Disability Equity Management

Disability Sensitization

Disability Sensitization

An Overview of Myths and Facts

•Fact: Adjusting to a disability requires adapting to a lifestyle, not bravery and courage.

Myth : People with disabilities are brave and courageous.

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Fact: The association between wheelchair use and illness may have evolved through hospitals using wheelchairs to transport sick people. A person may use a wheelchair for a variety of reasons, none of which may have anything to do with lingering illness.

Myth : All persons who use wheelchairs are chronically ill or sickly

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•Fact: Although most people who are blind develop their remaining senses more fully, they do not have a "sixth sense."

Myth : People who are blind acquire a "sixth sense."

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Fact: In the past, grouping people with disabilities in separate schools and institutions reinforced this misconception. Today, many people with disabilities take advantage of new opportunities to join mainstream society.

Myth : People with disabilities are more comfortable with "their own kind."

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• Fact: Anyone may offer assistance, but most people with disabilities prefer to be responsible for themselves.

Myth : Non-disabled people are obligated to "take care of" people with disabilities.

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Fact: People with disabilities go to school, get married, work, have families, do laundry, grocery shop, laugh, cry, pay taxes, get angry, have prejudices, vote, plan and dream like everyone else

Myth : The lives of people with disabilities are totally different than the lives of people without disabilities.

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Fact: Many people with disabilities are independent and capable of giving help. If you would like to help someone with a disability, ask if he or she needs it before you act.

Myth: People with disabilities always need help.

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Disability Sensitization

Some Aspects Related To Etiquette

• If you don't make a habit of leaning or hanging on people, don't lean or hang on someone's wheelchair. Wheelchairs are an extension of personal space.

Personal Space

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When you offer to assist someone with a vision impairment, allow the person to take your arm. This will help you to guide, rather than propel or lead, the person.

Vision Impairment

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Treat adults as adults. Call a person by his or her first name only when you extend this familiarity to everyone present. Don't patronize people who use wheelchairs by patting them on the head. Reserve this sign of affection for children.

Patronizing Behavior

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When speaking to a person with a disability ensure that you do not put physical strain on them – example standing in front of a person in a wheelchair – however asking is again a good general rule.

Eye level

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• When talking with someone who has a disability, speak directly to him or her, rather than through a companion who may be along.

Addressing a person with a disability

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If you would like to help someone with a disability, ask if he or she needs it before you act, and listen to any instructions the person may want to give.

Assistance

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When giving directions to a person in a wheelchair, consider distance, weather conditions and physical obstacles such as stairs, curbs and steep hills.

Directions

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• When directing a person with a visual impairment, use specifics such as "left a hundred feet" or "right two yards".

Directions

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When planning events involving persons with disabilities, consider their needs ahead of time. If an insurmountable barrier exists, let them know about it prior to the event.

Forward planning

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• Be careful not to complete sentences – it is patronizing

Speech impediments

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Disability Sensitization

Language

• "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me." It depends on who you talk to.

Really true?

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• Mark Twain once said the difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.

• How true this is.• Words are very powerful. They can lift your

spirits or crush them, put you in a good mood for the rest of the day or make you want to lock yourself in your room and hide away from the rest of the world.

Really true?

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• The term "handicapped" has become so outdated and derogatory that it is no longer used in any kind of government paperwork. The H-word, as Kathie Snow refers it to, has its origins in Old English, where it referred to the loser of a lottery-like game who was left with his cap in hand. The term eventually reversed itself to become hand in cap, hand i’ cap and finally, handicap.

• Article by Megan Drummond (People First)

Handicap

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• person with an intellectual, cognitive, developmental disability

•retarded; mentally defective

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• person who is blind, person who is visually impaired

•the blind

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• person with a disability

•the disabled; handicapped

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• person who is deaf

•the deaf; deaf and dumb

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• person with epilepsy, person with seizure disorder

•epileptic

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• person with a physical disability, physically disabled

•crippled; lame; deformed

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Affirmative

Derogatory

• People who are integrated, productive and successful citizens

•Overcame their disability/ courage

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Disability Sensitization

People with Disabilities

A mood disorder is a condition whereby the prevailing emotional mood is distorted or inappropriate to the

circumstances.

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Richard Dreyfuss - Richard Stephen Dreyfuss (born October 29, 1947) is an Academy Award-winning American actor – suffers from manic depressive disorder

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Harrison Ford - (born July 13, 1942) Ford is best known for his performances in the Star Wars film series and the adventurous archaeologist and action hero – depression in his youth

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Abraham Lincoln - (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the sixteenth President of the United States, serving from March 4, 1861 until his assassination – chronic form of depression

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Tourette syndrome (also called Tourette's syndrome, Tourette's disorder, Gilles de la

Tourette syndrome, GTS or, more commonly, simply Tourette's or TS) is an inherited

neurological disorder with onset in childhood, characterized by the presence of multiple physical (motor) tics and at least

one vocal (phonic) tic; these tics characteristically wax and wane.

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David Beckham - David suffers from OCD and it manifests itself through constant cleanliness and perfection of all that is around him

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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart - (1756-1791) In late 1992, the British Medical Journal published an article by endocrinologist Benjamin Simkin, M.D. speculating that Mozart had Tourette Syndrome

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Epilepsy is a common chronic neurological disorder that is characterized by recurrent unprovoked seizures. These seizures are transient signs and/or symptoms due to

abnormal, excessive or synchronous neuronal activity in the brain.

Epilepsy is usually controlled, but not cured, with medication, although surgery may be

considered in difficult cases.

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Sir Isaac Newton (4 January 1643 – 31 March 1727) A very important scientist who is responsible for founding the three laws of motion along with studies concerning Universal Gravitation

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Julius Caesar - (July 13, 100 BC – March 15, 44 BC), One of the most influential men in world history, Caesar participated in the army with distinction constantly excelling in leadership skills. He had a ruthless personality and thought of himself as far superior

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Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is a psychiatric disorder, specifically,

an anxiety disorder. OCD is manifested in a variety of forms, but is

most commonly characterized by a subject's obsessive drive to perform a

particular task or set of tasks, compulsions commonly termed rituals.

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Albert Einstein - (March 14, 1879 - April 18, 1955) Being one of the most important great minds of his century Albert Einstein was then known to suffer from dyslexia mainly because of his bad memory and his constant failure to memorize the simplest of things. It is also thought that he had OCD

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1809-1882 Naturalist, author; OCD and stutter.

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Schizophrenia is a psychiatric diagnosis that describes a mental

illness characterized by impairments in the perception or expression of

reality, most commonly manifesting as auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions or disorganized

speech and thinking in the context of significant social or occupational

dysfunction.

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John Nash - (born June 13, 1928) John Nash is an American mathematician working in differential geometry, game theory and partial differential equations.

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Disability Sensitization

South Africans With Disabilities

Disability Sensitization

Technology

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