I'm a Research Scholar, give me Introduc... - tlooto, The Most Powerful AcademicGPT

Chapter One: Introduction 1.1 Research Context and Rationale Literature functions both as a mirror of societal conditions and as a platform to critique and reconstruct prevailing socio-cultural narratives. Contemporary literary criticism has progressively engaged with diverse axes of marginalization, including race, gender, class, and disability. Within disability discourse, the social model of disability has emerged as a pivotal framework that challenges the traditional, medicalized conceptualization of disability as residing solely within individual impairments. Instead, it posits disability as a social construct produced by environmental, attitudinal, and institutional barriers that disable individuals with impairments [1][2]. This paradigm shift foregrounds disability as an issue of social justice, emphasizing transformation in societal structures rather than remediation of impairments alone [3]. This thesis undertakes a critical exploration of the social model of disability throug