| Abstrakt: |
I argue here that although the social model of disability which currently prevails in New Zealand is preferable in many ways to the earlier medical model, it is nevertheless based on a largely uni-dimensional concept of society and continues an established tradition of negativity, one that is evident in the ongoing use of the word 'disabled' itself by those who subscribe to the social model. I argue here that the social model of disability should be replaced by a communities-based model of equal access for people of differing abilities, one that is, in the New Zealand context, informed by a further developed Māori model of health and wellbeing proposed by Mason Durie, Te Whare Tapa Whā. This mode is designed in such a way as to accommodate difference and diversity. In the discussion of different models, I use the words 'disabled' and 'disability'; in other contexts, I replace 'disabled people' by 'people of differing abilities'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
