The Historical Construction of Physical Disability and Cultural Meaning in Ghana: A Systematic Historiographical Review
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Disability has been a social phenomenon clothed in stigma, marginalisation, and social orchestration. However, a person's disability stems from multiple factors and requires social understanding to ensure dignity, respect, and value. The purpose of this study is to conduct a systematic historiographical review of the scholarship that has analysed the cultural meaning of physical disabilities in Ghana and represented their historical construction and transformation across precolonial, colonial, and postcolonial periods. The author carried out a systematic historiographical review of peer-reviewed articles. The author identified 848 records through four principal scholarly information sources, two complementary platforms, and backward and forward citation chaining. Using a 38-item sample, the author applied two main criteria methodological rigour and historiographical significance related to the cultural meanings of physical disabilities in Ghana. Quality appraisal rated 29 studies as high quality and nine as medium quality; no study was rated low quality. The review shows that Ghana does not lack scholarship on disability; instead, existing scholarship focuses mainly on contemporary stigma, rehabilitation, family relations, healthcare, employment, and social inclusion. The literature reveals significant gaps, including the absence of land as a domain of analysis and limited attempts to address disability inequality in Ghana, which requires rigorous engagement with indigenous explanatory frameworks to recognise their enduring capacity and complexity in policy and practice. The historical reconstruction of how precolonial and colonial Ghanaian societies interpreted physical disability, and how these interpretations shaped personhood, status, authority, kinship, labour, and community belonging, remains fragmented and underexplored.
Author: John Abbam Nyarko
Institution: University of Cape Coast
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W7225630250
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