A handicap has been defined as an obstacle which society imposes on a person with a disability, i.e. inaccessible transportation or buildings, no signage, etc. Handicapped is not a term to describe human beings. A disability has been defined as a body function that operates differently. It’s that simple rather just a body function that operates differently. It is not easy to realize the consequence of the term worldwide design without first examining how people who are physically different have been treated socially, legally, and politically in the United States over the course of this century. While designers may not view this history as having bearing on their creativity or being of their making, their work has been instrumental in perpetuating the norms that exclude some people from using buildings, landscapes, and products.
Disability has been made visible in American life primarily as an outcome of military engagement and, therefore, was managed by the federal government in the War Department and, later, at the Veterans.
Administration. Civilians with disabilities were largely invisible and unaccounted for by the government until the latter half of the twentieth century when the social and physical isolation of people with physical and mental disability became the focus of civil rights legislation. Until that time, society managed to keep people who were different out of sight by building institutions such as nursing homes, asylums, and homeless shelters and using statutes such as ugly laws to prohibit from public places people whose different appearance might offend the citizenry.
Travel and tourism for the disabled are opportunities for the traveler and provider alike. While much public attention and many policy formulation efforts since the late 1960s have been given to barrier-free architectural design and local public transportation access, the most recent being the Americans With Disabilities Act of......
