Social Work Practice with Disability: Resolving the Inclusion/Exclusion Paradox

Abstract

While numerous models of disability have been proposed, the medical and social approaches still remain predominant in social work, both in analyzing the nature of disability and fashioning responses to it. Recent introduction of critical disability theory has further addressed stigma and activism but still trains its focus on deviating bodies. In this article, we propose an alternative approach to understanding disability, disjuncture theory, that can be used by progressive social workers to guide functioning and seamless inclusion in diverse environments. This conceptual model removes the bifurcation of humans into the normal “us” and the abnormal “them” by redirecting its analysis away from “who cannot do” to “what cannot be done by anyone.” Consistent with the values of social work, disjuncture thus reenvisages disability and levels of response that can jailbreak both intended and unintentional segregating and infrahumanizing meanings and actions. The theory builds on and advances the best of medical, social, and critical analyses, expanding disability beyond body, population category, or context to a universal human experience, thereby locating disability within the fabric of human diversity. We follow with a non-stigmatized creative and innovative method to reassert the role of social work as empowering and eliminating exclusion.