The notion of identity as a personal construction began with the study of adolescents. Erikson (1959, 1968) discussed the various stages that typically developing adolescents go through in the negotiation of self and identity. Throughout the twentieth century, however, collective or group identity has been used as a descriptor and/or political tool for groups typically residing at the margins of society (Duff, 2002). Zinn's A People's History of the United States (1990) chronicles political struggles centered in identity politics for: women, people of color, workers, and gay and lesbian groups. Each used identity as a tool for building common culture and empowerment. The concept of identity for people with disabilities is a fairly recent arrival in history. Throughout the past 500 years (and still present to some extent today), people with disabilities have been viewed as mad people, medical maladies, objects of charity, and deviants. Deportation of people with disabilities was the European norm in the 1600's (where the phrase "ship of fools" was first coined) (Focault, 1965, p. 46). Later, when sensory, physical, and cognitive impairments were a focus medical attention, institutional centers were built in Europe (1965) and later the United States. Some of these institutions, though exposed as abusive in nature in the 1960's (Blatt & Kaplan, 1966), are still in existence today (Taylor, 2001). The notions that people with various impairments are broken human beings in need of repair (Shapiro, 1993) and that correct science would fix the problem dominated disability discourse in the North America and Europe until the 1960's and 1970's (Cook, 2001; Ware, 2001).
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Chris Johnstone (2004) studied this question.