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This book aims to understand social representations of disability from the perspective of the disabled and its analogous to everyday and community life.The problems of the disabled people have gained widespread attention in the recent past. This book addresses the representation and life of the disabled from a sociological point of view in the context of emerging scenario.By focusing on social representation and everyday life the book seeks to address some of the major questions that are crucial to the survival, struggle and emancipation of the disabled in India.The major questions covered are the problems of care and support for the disabled, intra-familial relationships, patterns of leisure activities, feeling of relative deprivation, spiritual orientation and interaction with community members. The book also provides new insights to the public life of the disabled such as the problems and opportunities the disabled encounter within the society. This book is an effort to reorient and delineate the forms of social representations and the forces encouraging and constraining the life of the disabled in India.

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Debashis Pattanaik is a trained social science researcher. His research investigates social representation, social networks,and disability. He currently works in the area of social innovation and social network. Previously he was a lead researcher in OPAALS-IIT Kanpur( Open Knowledge System and Digital Ecosystem) social science research team.

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