Progressing diversity in HRD theory and practice

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Stepping outside normative neoliberal discourse: youth and disability meet – the case of Jody McIntyre

In May 2010, amidst the ‘global financial crisis’ a Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government succeeded a 12-year reign of New Labour in the United Kingdom, and ushered in massive welfare cuts. Although New Labour tabled major welfare and disability benefit reform, they arguably did not activate the harshest of these. This paper focuses on the backlash of youth and disability in the form of demonstrations; two groups that are being hit hard by the political shift to work-first welfare in an era of employment scarcity. The case of young disabled activist Jody McIntyre is used to explore parallels and divergences in neoliberal and ‘populist’ discourses of ‘risky’, troubling’ youth and disability

Vulnerable to Misinterpretation: Disabled People, 'Vulnerability' and the Fight for Legal Recognition

Hate crime is now an established term in the fields of racist and religious attacks and is acknowledged in the cultural proscription against attacks on Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender men and women. Disabled people, as so often is the case, are late in being afforded statutory recognition in hate crime. This can be explained in terms of wider constructions of disability and more pernicious and muddled constructions of disabled people as categorically, “Vulnerable”. This construction has arguably weakened the impetus to introducing hate crime provisions and legal justice for disabled people. There is now ample evidence of hate crime being evident and pervasive in the lives of many disabled people (Higgins, 2006; Quarmby, 2008). This paper will argue that the continued use of the term in criminal justice proceedings both perpetuates notions that disabled people are helpless and personally responsible for ‘their’ vulnerability, whilst ironically continuing to weaken legal protections for disabled people against such hate crimes and incidents. It will be argued that vulnerability is the product of poor community safeguards for disabled people and is better understood as a socio-political space rather than an inherent quality of an individual

Assessment and diagnosis of Developmental Language Disorder: The experiences of speech and language therapists

© The Author(s) 2019. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).Background: For many years research and practice have noted the impact of the heterogeneous nature of Developmental Language Disorder (also known as language impairment or specific language impairment) on diagnosis and assessment. Recent research suggests the disorder is not restricted to the language domain and against this background, the challenge for the practitioner is to provide accurate assessment and effective therapy. The language practitioner aims to support the child and their carers to achieve the best outcomes. However, little is known about the experiences of the language practitioner in the assessment process, in contrast to other childhood disorders, yet their expertise is central in the assessment and diagnosis of children with language disorder. Aims: This study aimed to provide a detailed qualitative description of the experiences of speech and language therapists involved in the assessment and diagnosis of children with Developmental Language Disorder. Methods & Procedures: The qualitative study included three focus groups to provide a credible and rich description of the experiences of speech and language therapists involved in the assessment of Developmental Language Disorder. The speech and language therapists who participated in the study were recruited from three NHS Trusts across the UK and all were directly involved in the assessment and diagnosis procedures. The lengths of practitioner experience ranged from 2 years to 38 years. The data was analysed using a thematic analysis in accordance with the principles set out by Braun & Clarke (2006). Outcomes & Results: The data showed a number of key themes concerning the experiences of speech and language therapists in assessing children with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). These themes ranged from the participants’ experiences of the barriers to early referral, challenges for assessment and the concerns over continued future support. Conclusions & Implications: This study provides first-hand evidence from speech and language therapists in the assessment of children with Developmental Language Disorder, drawing together experiences from language practitioners from different regions. The findings provide insight to the barriers to referral, the potential variations in the assessment process, the role of practitioner expertise and the challenges faced them. The importance of early intervention, useful assessment tools and future support were expressed. Taken together, the results relate to some issues to be addressed on a practical level and a continuing need for initiatives to raise awareness of DLD in the public domain.Peer reviewe

Mapping the Literature on Parent-Child Language across Activity Contexts:A Scoping Review

Linguistic interactions between parents and their children are frequently studied to investigate how children acquire language. From observations, researchers have identified interaction strategies that foster children’s language development. In turn, interventions to support children’s early language skills employ styles of interaction derived from these observations. However, researchers have not often considered how the activity context selected forobservation may affect the language used, or whether these contexts reflect children’s diverse experiences.The aim of this scoping review was to explore the breadth of literature about language use across a range of activities. Included studies described linguistic outputs of parents and typically developing children (aged 1;0 to 5;11 years) and activity context(s). Searches were conducted in PsycInfo, Medline, CINAHL, ERIC-ProQuest and Google Scholar. From 16,718 records, 59 studies were retained. Studies were charted according to the population included, linguistic outputs recorded, activity contexts studied and the methodological design. To allow for comparison of results across activity contexts, five thematic categories were identified: play activities, book reading, naturalistic routines, media and methodological implications. Challenges for future research are discussed, including ways to ensure the ecological validity of findings by coupling naturalistic language recordings with data collected during diverse everyday activity contexts