A 45 year old man stricken by a rare disease that has taken the very spirit, the drive out of most men however Steve Brown has seen life from 'both sides ." Memories of his past accomplishments and those of his handicapped father, brother, and sister, have lent a hand in the making of a determined spirit sought after by many. Equipped with his guitar, a notebook, and a tank of gas, and all the peace he can muster, Steve invites all who dare to venture a slice of the fortitude he enjoys and will gladly pass on to others. Steve's spirit, soul, and can do attitude is surely infectious and will enable any person to find peace in this topsy turvy world. Highly recommended you have a box of tissues handy.

The fact that you have begun reading this means that you have come to a crossroads. You ultimately, only have one of two choices that you will make. One choice is to continue reading this book and it will (not can) enhance your perspective on life and "being" around others. The book "touches" several genres (inspirational, self-improvement, handicapped, health and fitness, social sciences, philosophy, family, mind, body, and soul) in a combined unique manner and accurately highlights each that is naturally intertwined in this autobiography and anyone's life. This book goes beyond age, gender, social, cultural boundaries, and even time to make it applicable to any human. This autobiography's events were typed and recorded vocally by me, the author, as I regained the physical capabilities. These are all true experiences by me, the author, that were encountered along my journey. The "story" illustrates the similarities of "two worlds" that some people think are completely different; one being "better" than the other. The experiences are presented in such a form to make it relative to any reader. This autobiography was written in the style and format that creatively gives the reader the truthful experience in order. Many people want to be at the top, but how many have and can give perspectives from both "top and bottom." All emotions are met when reading this book and it is much more than a life story. It is "The story within the life becoming the life within the story "

The Bible and Disability: A Commentary (BDC) is the first comprehensive commentary on the Bible from the perspective of disability. The BDC examines how the Bible constructs or reflects human wholeness, impairment, and disability in all their expressions. Biblical texts do envision the ideal body, but they also present visions of the body that deviate from this ideal, whether physically or through cognitive impairments or mental illness. The BDC engages the full range of these depictions of body and mind, exploring their meaning through close readings and comparative analysis. The BDC enshrines the distinctive interpretive imagination required to span the worlds of biblical studies and disability studies. Each of the fourteen contributors has worked at this intersection; and through their combined expertise, the very best of both biblical studies and disability studies culminates in detailed textual work of description, interpretation, and application to provide a synthetic and synoptic whole. The result is a close reading of the Bible that gives long-overdue attention to the fullness of human identity narrated in the Scriptures. Not for sale in the UK.

Despite the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, many forms of discrimination against people with disabilities are still practiced, denying opportunity for employees, as well as the employers who might hire and support them. Based on a multi-year research project by a team of experts in human resource management, economics, and communications, Hidden Talent showcases the innovative practices of organizations that are actively hiring, training, and retaining people with disabilities-and thriving as a result. The authors reveal the roots of disability discrimination and demonstrate the benefits, to employers and employees alike, of investing in disabled workers, featuring in-depth case examples. Additional resources, including an overview of the ADA, information on tax and legal incentives, and listing of related publications, organizations, and websites, will make this book essential for anyone researching, managing, or experiencing the dynamics of disability in the workplace. The Americans with Disabilities Act was signed into law in 1990 to protect and assist over 20 million people with disabilities. Though its mandates for business are far-reaching, many forms of discrimination are still practiced, denying opportunity for employees and potential employees with disabilites, as well as the companies that might hire and support them. Meanwhile, as many analysts argue, we are heading toward a high-skill labor shortage, with a largely untapped resource ready to fill the gap. Based on a multi-year research project by a team of experts in human resource management, economics, and communications, Hidden Talent showcases the innovative practices of organizations that are actively hiring, training, and retaining people with disabilities-and thriving as a result. The authors reveal the roots of disability discrimination, and demonstrate the benefits, to employers and employees alike, of investing in disabled workers, featuring in-depth case examples. Additional resources, including an overview of the ADA, information on tax and legal incentives, and a listing of related publications, organizations, and websites, will make this book essential for anyone researching, managing, or experiencing the dynamics of disability in the workplace.

Although it is commonly believed that deafness and disability limits a person in a variety of ways, Valuing Deaf Worlds in Urban India describes the two as a source of value in postcolonial India. Michele Friedner argues that the experiences of deaf people offer an important portrayal of contemporary self-making and sociality under new regimes of labor and economy in India. Friedner contends that deafness actually becomes a source of value for deaf Indians as they interact with nongovernmental organizations, with employers in the global information technology sector, and with the state. In contrast to previous political economic moments, deaf Indians increasingly depend less on the state for education and employment, and instead turn to novel and sometimes surprising spaces such as NGOs, multinational corporations, multilevel marketing businesses, and churches that attract deaf congregants. They also gravitate towards each other. Their social practices may be invisible to outsiders because neither the state nor their families have recognized Indian Sign Language as legitimate, but deaf Indians collectively learn sign language, which they use among themselves, and they also learn the importance of working within the structures of their communities to maximise their opportunities. Valuing Deaf Worlds in Urban India analyses how diverse deaf people become oriented toward each other and disoriented from their families and other kinship networks. More broadly, this book explores how deafness, deaf sociality, and sign language relate to contemporary society.

This open access edited volume explores physical disability and sexuality in South Africa, drawing on past studies, new research conducted by the editors, and first-person narratives from people with physical disabilities in the country. Sexuality has long been a site of oppression and discrimination for people with disabilities based on myths and misconceptions, and this book explores how these play out for people with physical disabilities in the South African setting. One myth with which the book is centrally concerned, is that people with disabilities are unable to have sex, or are seen as lacking sexuality by society at large. Societal understandings of masculinity, femininity, bodies and attractiveness, often lead people with physical disabilities to be seen as being undesirable romantic or sexual partners. The contributions in this volume explore how these prevailing social conditions impact on the access to sexual and reproductive healthcare, involvement in romantic relationships, childbearing, and sexual citizenship as a whole, of people with physical disabilities in the Western Cape of the country. The authors' research, and first person contributions by people with physical disabilities themselves, suggest that education and public health policy must change, if the sexual and reproductive health rights and full inclusion of people with disabilities are to be achieved.

A happy O'Malley family of four sisters, one brother, father and mother, lived in a row house in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The smallest, youngest, and favorite of all was Doris. However, her life changed dramatically at age eleven, and her family and others were devastated. We were heading to the mall when I realized she was not moving. The ambulance was called and in those days there were no MRI, and little other than x-ray, so at first we didn't know what happened to my little sister. Finally the diagnosis of nephritis was made, and Doris was put on penicillin for one year, but this horrible disease struck again. Soon it was evident that we were in for the long battle; and Doris' lonely, challenging journey began. Prayer, confidence, and an unyielding mother's love brought Doris to a healing. The determined girl then took matters into her own hands. First, off to school for her elementary certificate, followed by a high school diploma. Then, some financial support, she graduated as a licensed vocational nurse. At age of 42, Doris proudly walked across the stage and received her diploma, with perfect attendance. She was now able to go out into the world beaming and independent. Tragically, endometrial cancer crept unrecognized into the single girl's life. It spread to a full blown cancer death, but to the very end, Doris still flashed the V for victory sign... even on her death bed. Together, my little sister and I walked through the dark passages and right into the light as the angels swept her away on November 20, 1992. Read this remarkable, inspiring story of loss, faith, and the fighting spirit of Doris O'Malley.

This book builds upon critiques of development in the disability domain by investigating the necessity and implications of theorising disability from the Global South and how development policies and practices pertaining to disabled people in such contexts might be improved by engaging with their voices and agency. The author focuses on the lived experiences of disabled people in Burkina Faso, while situating these experiences, where necessary, in the wider national and regional contexts. She explores development agencies' interventions with disabled people and the need to re-think these practices and ideologies which are often framed within western contexts. This work will appeal to policy makers, NGOs, academics, students and researchers in the fields of development and disability studies.

Our children mean the world to us. They are so central to our hopes and dreams that we will do almost anything to keep them healthy, happy, and safe. What happens, then, when a child has serious problems? In Family Trouble, a compelling portrait of upheaval in family life, sociologist Ara Francis tells the stories of middle-class men and women whose children face significant medical, psychological, and social challenges. Francis interviewed the mothers and fathers of children with such problems as depression, bi-polar disorder, autism, learning disabilities, drug addiction, alcoholism, fetal alcohol syndrome, and cerebral palsy. Children's problems, she finds, profoundly upset the foundations of parents' everyday lives, overturning taken-for-granted expectations, daily routines, and personal relationships. Indeed, these problems initiated a chain of disruption that moved through parents' lives in domino-like fashion, culminating in a crisis characterized by uncertainty, loneliness, guilt, grief, and anxiety. Francis looks at how mothers and fathers often differ in their interpretation of a child's condition, discusses the gendered nature of child rearing, and describes how parents struggle to find effective treatments and to successfully navigate medical and educational bureaucracies. But above all, Family Trouble examines how children's problems disrupt middle-class dreams of the ""normal"" family. It captures how children's problems ""radiate"" and spill over into other areas of parents' lives, wreaking havoc even on their identities, leading them to reevaluate deeply held assumptions about their own sense of self and what it means to achieve the good life. Engagingly written, Family Trouble offers insight to professionals and solace to parents. The book offers a clear message to anyone in the throes of family trouble: you are in good company, and you are not as different as you might feel.

This book is a study of the pioneer early county asylums, which were intended to provide for the 'cure', and 'safe custody' of people suffering from the ravages of insanity. It considers the origins of the asylums, how they were managed, the people who staffed them, their treatment practices, and the experiences of the people who were incarcerated. 'Community care' in the late twentieth century has led us to abandon the network of nineteenth century lunatic asylums. This book reminds us of the ideals that lay behind them. The book contains extensive material regarding particular cities/counties, e.g. Nottingham, Lincoln, Stafford, Wakefield, Lancaster, Bedford, West Riding, Norfolk, Cornwall, Dorset, Suffolk, etc.

This edited collection of contributions from media scholars, film practitioners and film historians connects the vibrant fields of documentary and disability studies. Documentary film has not only played an historical role in the social construction of disability but continues to be a strong force for expression, inclusion and activism. Offering essays on the interpretation and conception of a wide variety of documentary formats, Documentary and Disability reveals a rich set of resources on subjects as diverse as Thomas Quasthoff's opera performances, Tourette syndrome in the developing world, queer approaches to sexual functionality, Channel 4 disability sports broadcasting, the political meaning of cochlear implant activation, and Christoph's Schlingensief's celebrated Freakstars 3000.

This book has been a work in progress. In the spring of 2000 I started this project and began to collect data and conduct interviews. I copied every article I could find in the Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness and its predecessors Outlook for the Blind and New Outlook for the Blind. I was fortunate to locate Blindness the annual publication of the American Association of Workers for the Blind. One of the greatest finds was the library at the American Foundation for the Blind. The library contains dozens of volumes related to orientation and mobility. Within two years I had amassed a considerable collection of resources. I began working through the materials and along the way prepared some papers for various conferences. A dramatic increase in administrative responsibilities, as well as the tyranny of meeting grant deadlines, diverted me from giving concentrated effort to this book. All that changed as I reduced my workload in order to devote almost all my efforts over the past nine months to this project.

This is the first detailed assessment of the development and implementation of social policy to deal with the problem of the `mentally deficient' in Britain between 1870 and 1959. Mathew Thomson analyses all the factors involved in the policy-making process, beginning with the politics of the legislature and showing how the demands of central government were interpreted by local authorities, resulting in a wide and varied distribution of medical, institutional, and community care in different parts of the country. The efforts of health professionals, voluntary organizations and the families themselves are considered, alongside questions about the influence of changing concepts of class, gender, and citizenship. The author queries the belief that the policy of segregation was largely unsuccessful, and reveals a hitherto unrecognized system of care in the community. He reframes our understanding of the campaign for sterilization and examines why British policy-makers avoided extremist measures such as the compulsory sterilization introduced in Germany and parts of the US during this period. Thomson shows that the problem of mental deficiency cannot be understood simply in terms of eugenics but must also be considered as part of the process of adjusting to democracy in the twentieth century.

This book examines how intellectual disability is affected by stigma and how this stigma has developed. Around two per cent of the world's population have an intellectual disability but their low visibility in many places bears witness to their continuing exclusion from society. This prejudice has an impact on the family of those with an intellectual disability as well as the individual themselves and affects the well-being and life chances of all those involved. This book provides a framework for tackling intellectual disability stigma in institutional processes, media representations and other, less overt, settings. It also highlights the anti-stigma interventions which are already in place and the central role that self-advocacy must play.