The AKKA-board – performing mobility, disability and innovation

Abstract

This study involves a mobility device with relevance for health and well-being for severely disabled persons. The purpose of this study is to examine some of the geographical, innovative and existential implications of the performance of place through mobility that the AKKA-board produces for severely disabled people. What does mobility and place mean in terms of supporting human skills that are being performed with the help of the AKKA-board? It is concluded that mobility in terms of a self-controlled movement is connected to enabling individual decision-making, independence and well-being.

Keywords:

• mobility
• performativity
• disability
• existential implications
• open innovation
• human geography
• disability studies

Notes

1. See also Fialka (2004), Green (2003), Hoffman et al. (2006), Iarskia-Smirnova (1999), Larson (1998, 2010), Lawlor and Mattingly (1998), Lindblad, Rasmussen, and Sandman (2005), McLaughlin (2006), Landsman (2003), McKeever and Miller (2004), Ryan and Runswick-Cole (2008), Snow (2001) and Traustadottir (2000) for argumentation concerning the importance of including families and institutions working with disabilities.

2. Unicef Convention of the Rights of the Child; see http://www.unicef.org/crc/.

3. See http://youtu.be/zUZkRT-IPk4.

4. See http://youtu.be/Y7LuF6sxSCo.

5. See http://youtu.be/zUZkRT-IPk4.