ABSTRACT
This chapter provides the cultural productions that determine how disability is viewed and that inform behaviour and practice. Since time immemorial, disability in its various forms has been a consistent and pervasive reality. This expression of fragility, universally present in time and space, is likely to affect the entire chain of life. In a functional or relational conception, the disability is no longer thought of in terms of “being”. A dynamic approach comes in to replace the lesional perspective. An exogenous conception reminds us of perceptions of the disability as accident, related to the action of an extrinsic element. In perceptions dominated by the conception of a malevolent influence, the disability is considered to be an absolute evil, an abnormality, a biological deviance and, at the same time, a social deviance. In a functional or relational conception, the disability is no longer thought of in terms of “being”.
