ERIC Number: EJ1448193
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2019
Pages: 19
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-2514-5347
EISSN: N/A
Disability as a Social Construction: Investigating How Autism Is Represented in the Mainstream Media
Lauren Hamilton
Prism: Casting New Light on Learning, Theory & Practice, v2 n2 p20-38 2019
This paper employs Critical Discourse Analysis to examine the representation of autism within a small sample of mainstream newspaper articles. The paper concludes that media, as a communicative tool, has enormous cultural power whereby the portrayal of Autism as a disability is predicated on notions of normality and underpinned by ableist ideology. Such promotion of normalcy and disability in general can serve to generate and sustain disabling barriers and oppression. This hegemonic practice therefore produces a replicative process that is detrimental to the production of social justice and equality within contemporary society and culture.
Descriptors: Foreign Countries, Autism Spectrum Disorders, Newspapers, Mass Media Effects, Mass Media Role, Social Justice, Disability Discrimination, Attitudes toward Disabilities, Labeling (of Persons)
Liverpool John Moores University. Student Life Building, 10 Copperas Hill, Liverpool, L3 5AH, UK. Tel: +44-151-231-4648; Web site: https://openjournals.ljmu.ac.uk/index.php/prism/
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Information Analyses; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: United Kingdom
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A