As it is generally conceived, knowledge belongs to the individual: we imagine how a lightbulb suddenly illuminates above the scientist's head, a muse whispers in the philosopher's ear, cogs slide into place as wheels turn in the thinker's mind, and, "Eureka!" an idea is born. As an individualistic experience, knowledge is secure in the repository of the mind, a "steel trap" as it is so often referred, which can only be breached by the most sophisticated and precise methods. From these popular representations of knowledge, one can extrapolate further to conclude that knowledge is not made, it is received. All of these metaphors of knowledge present a passive subject waiting for knowledge to be imparted from the Cosmos. Much like knowledge, a disability and, reflexively, the knowledge of disability, is an individually sited matter; disability is something to be had, possessed, or owned, not shared. Similar to knowledge, disability is not actively produced, it just "is." And disability, too, is internally located, often being attributed as the outcome of physiological malfunction. It follows then, that because both knowledge and disability are separately regarded as individualistic phenomena, as located with(in) the individual, and as existing independently of him or her, that knowledge of disability would also share these characteristics. This study's objective, however, is to prove just the opposite: to position disability as a form of knowledge, and therefore, the knowledge of disability as the endpoint of an ongoing process of social interaction. I use discourse analysis to analyze interviews conducted with staff members of a university office responsible for providing academic accommodations to students with disabilities, in conjunction with documents authored and disseminated by this organization. My study conceives discourse as language in action. By this I mean that discourse creates the very social structures it is presumed to describe. I also understand discourse as reflexive, meaning that embedded within discourse are larger social and moral norms. Believing that analyzing discourse allows for normative beliefs on knowledge and disability to be clearly displayed, I ask the following questions: By what assumptions do members organize disability in their daily practice? What role does communication play in these processes of social organization? What resources or forms of evidence are necessary to determine, to produce knowledge of, disability? And does everyone have equal access to these resources? This study's findings hold broad implications for diverse stakeholders. For the field of Communication, this study affirms the need for revised ways of understanding communication, as it shows how antiquated ideations of communication as a linear exchange of information narrowly define what counts as knowledge. Additionally, this study also contributes to Disability Studies in that rather than arguing disability as a social artifact from an exclusively conceptual standpoint, it empirically makes a case for disability as the product of social interaction. For the organizational members consulted in this study, I offer recommendations for their praxis. The final, and arguably the most important, party that this study has implications for is the student with a disability. Because this study promotes a more inclusive approach to disability, and because it encourages a lesser burden of proof with respect to knowing disability, this study is of particular interest to the individuals who are classified as "disabled."

In 1990, the Americans with Disability Act (ADA) was enacted to support disabled Americans as they sought to procure equality in society and the workplace. Despite these intentions, full implementation of the ADA has been fraught with court challenges and legislative amendments. As it currently stands, it is unclear as to how the judicial system is collectively interpreting a qualified disability. Using Clark and Connolly's interpretation of legal textualism as the theoretical foundation, the purpose of this case study of the Americans with Disabilities Act was to better understand and explore how the judiciary is currently interpreting qualified disability post-ADA amendments. Data for this study included court interpretations and post-ADA amendment cases among the 12 United States Circuit Courts. These data were coded through a multi-stage coding procedure that included evaluating coding, cycle coding, hand coding, and subcoding. Coded data were analyzed using a thematic analysis procedure. The key theme emerging from this study indicated that the ADA amendments still do not promote congressional intent in the judiciary. This study has implications for positive social change by informing Congress, legal practitioners, legal scholars, social scientists, and the disability community on the ways in which the judiciary is interpreting ADA amendments collectively among the 12 federal circuit courts.

The purposes of the study were to determine the level of priority of importance of administrative problem areas and specific problem items preventing the implementation of special programs for the educable mentally retarded in Utah. The study was conducted using a survey of twenty-seven school districts in the state of Utah lacking a sequential program for the educable mentally retarded in grades one through six. A questionnaire was sent to 184 selected respondents, including school board chairmen, superintendents, and elementary principals. Responses were received from 92 percent of the original selection. The respondent was asked to rank each of the problem items according to one of five choices, major, moderate, average, minor, or no problem to implementation. Results were evaluated on the basis of agreement among the rankings of the respondents, the relationship of the rankings, priority of the administrative areas, priority of the problem items, and individual group rankings. Statistical treatment revealed significance at the .01 level for the level of agreement and relationship among the rankings of the administrative problem areas. Further treatment revealed the priority of administrative problem categories in order of major importance to be: (1) professional personnel, (2) pupil personnel; (3) supervision , (4) communications, (5) research, (6) finance, and (7) policy. Individual problem items used in the questionnaire were ranked by priority of importance as perceived by the respondents as a combined group as well as by individual groups. There were sixty-two problem items ranked in order of priority. The conclusions arrived at as a result of the analysis of the data included: (1) there was a high level of agreement among the perceptions of the administrators in ranking the importance of the problem areas and specific items , (2) the respondents as individual and combined groups perceived the category of obtaining and retaining qualified professional personnel as the major problem to implementation of the special program, (3) the individual problem of greatest concern was the obtaining of a qualified classroom teacher for the educable mentally retarded, (4) communications are needed to inform the parents, public, and school faculty to gain support for t he educational needs of the educable mentally retarded, (5) administrators recognize the need for early identification of the potential retardate, accurate diagnosis and educational placement as important to program implementation, and (6) it appeared that present school policies are adequate in meeting the needs of program implementation of the educable mentally retarded.

The Neurological Impress Method is a system of unison reading in which the student and the instructor read orally together. The theory underlying the method is that the auditory feedback from the reader's own voice and from someone else's voice accurately reading the same material establishes a new learning process. The effectiveness of the impress method with students identified as having a specific learning disability was examined. The subjects were 16 sixth through ninth graders, ranging in age from 13 to 16, and assigned to a special school setting. Each student had been receiving special education services for at least two years and was reading at least two years below grade level as indicated by a standardized reading achievement test. The experimental group received tutoring in the impress method 15 minutes daily, four days a week, to comprise a total of 10 hours of training in the technique. Pre- and posttesting were done to assess reading instructional levels and attitudes toward reading. Scores in both achievement and attitude were compiled,and a statistical analysis was performed that determined the results to be significant. It was concluded that the Neurological Impress Method is an effective remedial procedure for use with learning disabled students. The procedure produced significant results which were manifested by improvements in reading achievement and development of improved attitudes toward the reading process.

The current project investigated the brain-behavior relationships between fusiform volume and orthographic processing in children with Reading Disability (RD) and Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). It was hypothesized that there would be differences in fusiform volume between those with and without RD. Individuals with and without ADHD were not expected to differ in fusiform volume and an interaction in the RD/ADHD group was not expected. Children with RD/ADHD were expected to have similar volumes to children who have RD. It also was hypothesized that size of the left fusiform segments would be correlated with three orthographic processing tasks and tests of reading achievement (i.e., Orthographic Choice, Homophone/Pseudohomophone Choice and the Colorado Perceptual Speed Task; Letter Word Identification, Word Attack, and Reading Fluency). Results indicated that there were no group differences in fusiform volume between children with and without RD as well as with and without ADHD. There were also no relationships between the left fusiform and any of the orthographic or reading achievement measures. However, all three measures of orthographic processing were significantly related to the right posterior fusiform. Additionally, Homophone/Pseudohomophone Choice and Reading Fluency demonstrated a trend with the right anterior fusiform. The findings reported in this study were largely unexpected and suggest that further research examining the relationship between right fusiform volume and orthographic processing is warranted.

The unprecedented size and scope of the American Civil War fundamentally redefined the relationship between state and citizen. Through its conscription laws, the Union government empowered itself to standardize and evaluate the bodies of its citizens; the concurrent General Law pension system extended this standardization into the realm of disability. The government served as both national physician and national accountant, distributing millions of dollars a year to men it deemed unable to earn up to their potential due to wounds and diseases contracted in the Union's defense. Moreover, since so many disabilities were the result of disease - and therefore invisible to the naked eye - the state also asserted its power to certify to the taxpayers that these veterans were indeed among the "deserving poor," not idlers or parasites. This became especially important as pension-related expenses ballooned to the second-largest line item on the budget, and the "veteran vote" became the most important single-issue bloc in American politics. Veterans were themselves voters, however, and could negotiate at least some of the terms of their disability through the political process. This established that disability is discursively constructed - it is a social position, not a permanent physical impairment. Veterans' organizations might sweep socially problematic old soldiers up into Homes, but veterans always retained their influence at the ballot box. Thus, the same political process which enabled the state to seize unprecedented powers of surveillance also kept these new powers at least somewhat in check.

This dissertation examines the lives of Japanese disabled war veterans and the activism of the Japanese Disabled Veterans Association (JDVA: Nippon Shôigunjin kai) in the early postwar period, beginning immediately following the Allied Occupation in the summer of 1945 and ending in 1963, when the National Diet passed the "Act on Special Aid to the Wounded and Sick Retired Soldiers" (Senshôbyôsha Tokubetsu Engo-hô). Established in 1952, the JDVA would play a leading role in securing welfare for Japanese disabled war veterans.

The availability of online college and university courses have continued to grow, offering opportunities for education to students that may find attending in a regular classroom difficult, if not impossible. The number of students with disabilities enrolling in online courses is also growing. However, because of the mode of delivery (via computer/internet), blind and low vision college and university students can find it difficult to participate fully in an online course if it is not designed with accessibility in mind. Education is directly related to blind and low vision individuals becoming fully employed and independent. Blind and low vision college and university students who have previously taken an online course and used assistive technology devices to access the computer are aware of the issues of accessibility to online courses. The current study began by asking a group of blind and low-vision students to answer seven open-ended questions regarding their experiences accessing online courses at their college or university. The group responses generated 25 survey items and participants were asked to rate each item. Survey items were evaluated and participants were given the opportunity to re-rate their answers based on the group’s responses. The final results were evaluated and ranked in importance according to participant responses. Results were discussed along with the implications, limitations, and recommendations for future research.

Magister Scientiae (Physiotherapy) - MSc(Physio) / Evidence indicates that the current physiotherapy management of patients with chronic non-specific LBP only offers moderate benefit. Combined treatment programmes, addressing body as well as the mind, shows promising results in developed countries with adequate resources but low evidence in poorly-resourced countries and contexts. This is another gap in the existing knowledge. The study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of a combined physiotherapy and cognitive-behavioral therapy treatment, compared to physiotherapy alone, in reducing pain, disability, mental health and fear-avoidance behavior, in adults with non-specific low back pain. The systematic review included articles published, in English only, between 1985-2018 (July) in the following databases available at the University of The Western Cape: EbscoHost, BioMedCentral, Cambridge Journals Online, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, Medline (EbscoHost), Medline (Pubmed), Sabinet Reference, SAGE Journals Online, ScienceDirect,SciFinder Scholar, SCOPUS, Wiley Online Library, Springerlink and PubMed.Two reviewers independently evaluated the methodological quality of full text articles, using a critical appraisal tool. Fourteen (14) articles were included based on methodological rigour. Five (5) articles were included in the narrative synthesis and nine (9) articles were included in the meta-analyses. Statistically significant improvements in pain, disability and mental health, in favour of combination therapy for patients with chronic lower back pain were found. A small but statistically significant cumulative effect size for mental health (g = -0.26, Z = -4.49, p <.01) , physical disability (g = -0.27, Z = -5.09, p <.01) and pain (g = -.27, Z = -5.05, p <.01) , in favour of a combination of cognitive behavioural therapy and physiotherapy in patients with chronic lower back pain was found. In addition, a medium but statistically significant cumulative effect size (g = -0.50, Z = -6.95, p <.01), in terms of fear avoidance, was found in favour of the combination therapy. In conclusion, physiotherapy in combination with cognitivebehavioral therapy was more effective than physiotherapy alone, in reducing pain, disability, mental health and fear-avoidance behaviour, in adults with non-specific low back pain. Ethics: Permission for the study was obtained from the university’s Biomedical Research Ethics Committee.

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