Inclusive Language
Enrique Cruz
Lecturer, School of Nursing and Midwifery
Why study this?
- Refinement of professional language
- Choice of words can make or break working
relationships with
- Patient/Family/Carers
- Healthcare worker
- Community
Person before descriptors
Inclusive language
- Aka. People-first language
Empower pp; not to always remind pp bout their impairment
Language to avoid People-first language
Disabled, handicapped Person with a disability
Dumb, mute Person who is unable to speak
Deaf Person living with deafness
Demented Person living with dementia
Retarded Person with developmental disability
Mongoloid Person with Down syndrome
Insane, psycho, nuts Person with psychiatric disability
Epileptic Person living with seizure disorders
Crippled, lame, spastic Person with physical disability
Wheelchair-bound Person who uses a wheelchair
Disabled parking/bathroom Accessible parking/bathroom
1
Prevent pp from exclusion, segregation or even worse discrimination
Guide to inclusive language
- Ask yourself, is the disability descriptor really necessary?
- The person (including children) have a right to determining to whom
their diagnosis is shared.
- If it is, will it have an impact on anyone?
- ie. siblings of “special children”
- Consider being on the more ‘specific side. General terms tend to
make the person feel that they need to overcome stereotyping and
discrimination.
- Use language that emphasises the ‘personhood’ of the person
instead of labelling the person by their illness or disability
- The person has not been lost to the disease.
- Avoid language that causes segregation
- “Special needs kids” implies “the segregated kids”
- Person first language Children receiving special education or
Child living with ASD
Clever. It’s results. Test scores. An A+ on an
essay. Sure, that’s one way to think about
clever. It’s an important way. But at La Trobe,
it’s not the only way. We’re globally renowned
Thank you!
for our research and academic prowess. But
we’re also Cruz
Enrique proud to be doing things a little
differently.
Lecturer andThe human
Clinical Nurse side of clever is
Consultant
Email:
[email protected]important to us.
Twitter: @eric3cruz So, we’ll teach you how to
relate to other people. How to empathise.
How to be a citizen of the world. That’s how
we build well-rounded humans. They’re the
people employers want to hire. They’re also
the people the world needs to build a better
future. Don’t just be clever. Be all kinds of clever.
