Understanding the parctice of sport by disabled people

In the collective ideal, sport is seen as a fertile ground for "integration through sport"; belief based on the affirmation of an integrative function fundamentally linked to sport. This idea is belied by historians, anthropologists and sociologists of sport.

The "living together" in the sports society may seem a little paradoxical. On the one hand, people with more or less severe "failures" enter the space of the Olympic gods with sculpted bodies that breathe health and well-being ... On the other hand, the world of "Disability" "arrives with all his clichés and prejudices in a universe in which the performances of" validate "them return to their state and difficulties.

To understand the sports practices of people with disabilities, their uses and their functions, we must understand the logic of social movements and the people who built them, developed them and who practice them. For example, the "silent sport", practiced by the deaf and hard of hearing people from the beginning of the 20th century in France, used as a practice of community and linguistic regrouping, can not be confused with the sports practices offered to the mutilated young people of the Second World War. World, by an English doctor in perspective of functional rehabilitation; which was the premise of the Handisport. Sport for people with intellectual disabilities was born in the 70s in a charitable logic in the United States, then educational in France where it will take a form centered on education and learning through sport. Thus, these sports movements originate in very different uses of sport.

70% of people with disabilities interviewed are interested in sport in general *

sport is recognized as a need by 9 out of 10 people *

74% of French people with disabilities exercise or exercise at least once in a while; 49% do it at least once a week *

Gradually, athletes with disabilities emancipated themselves and moved away from the medical and educational to organize practices of leisure and competition "between stigmatized peers". In this "associative" practice among people who are discredited in the society in which they live, paradoxically the integrative function, not of sport but of these sports movements, is born.

Social interactions have been studied and there is evidence that sports practices are chosen by active minorities to integrate through "destigmatization". Athletes with disabilities find in practice "between themselves" the strength to assert their bodily and sporting singularities, and then build the conditions for possibilities of integration, that is to say a reciprocal adjustment between stigmatized persons but having overcome the prejudices that weigh on them, and a society that is gradually putting into question its negative representations of disability.

"physical activity" ≠ "rehabilitation"

* 70% practice it from a health / well-being perspective: to improve their health, improve their physical appearance, fight against disability more effectively (31%)
* 48% practice it from a leisure perspective: to have fun, relax
* 32% practice it with a view to social integration: being with friends, meeting new people, better integrating into society
* 28% practice it from a personal improvment perspective: improve their self-esteem, develop new skills
* 27% practice it for the spirit of sport: to excel, to compete.

Physical activity and sport is an ideal ground for sharing emotions and values such as surpassing oneself.

Why is the "Handi-Valide" mix so successful nowaday?

Social taxonomy, this way of wanting to classify individuals, is undoubtedly challenged by groups of people who no longer want to remain wisely in the huts in which they have been placed.

At a time when parity is advocated, the mixture of genres also applies to individuals stigmatized by a disability, disability or illness. Stigma is what makes a person different from the category in which one would like to place it; there is therefore a stigma because of the disagreement between the actual social identity of the individual (what he is in the eyes of society) and the virtual social identity of that person (what he should be) .

That's where our slogan comes from: "Handi-Valide, the art of being yourself!"

Reférences:

D'une minorité à l'autre - Loisir et Société Vol 23 - 2000

Real constraints and perceived constraints

IIt should be recalled that the law of 11 February 2005 and the different international classifications of impairments, activities and social participation define disability by contextualizing it. Disability is measured in the interactions between a person with a disability (more or less marked) with his environment. The medical aspect of disability is therefore a socially secondary aspect of the real problems of the individual.

For most of the people, sport and its practice are not "natural" ! anything interfering might stop the whilling to practice.

Motivational research

Eventhough disabled people are willing to exercise, they are under strong constraints.

In practice itself

It turns out that the Mixi Handi-Valide can not ignore the minimum layout of the structure (if we really want to make it accessible "to all"), if on preparatory strategies for mutual acceptance . This means that the opening of a club "to all audiences", will be a real opening to people with disabilities that is part of a real process of openness to this specific public (communication, awareness ...).

Sources :

*Enquête TNS SOFRES - Sport et Handicap - Avril 2015

Sport et Handicaps en Europe - Sport et Citoyenneté - Octobre 2010