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http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://www.theshorthorn.com/news/disability-studies-minor-to-be-available/article_00450aba-ac7e-11e2-bec7-001a4bcf6878.html&ct=ga&cad=CAEQARgAIAAoATAAOABApNXgiwVIAVAAWABiBWVuLVVT&cd=CuZcTFTcxkY&usg=AFQjCNGcDqFLxvC727O4f5WeqZYrQnVmtA The university will now be offering a minor in disability studies. History assistant professor Sarah Rose said UTA’s history with being accessible to students with disabilities is one of the main reasons the minor will now be offered. Faculty from liberal arts, education and health professions, architecture, business and social work will be teaching the courses. Rose said the classes will be about physical as well as mental disabilities. The new classes include Disability and Art and Special Topics in History: History of Madness and Mental Illness, she said. “At this point, there are only two new courses that will be available in the fall,” Marvin Dulaney, associate professor and department chairman of history, said. “All the rest are courses that are already being offered.” He also said students who are interested should be able to register for the classes soon. “The classes have gone through the university curriculum committee, so they are approved,” he said. “They should show up on the system within the next month or so.” Dulaney said adding these courses is just an addition to what the university is known for. “We have been able to act on and develop a program that feeds right into what the university has always done throughout its history in terms of accessibility,” Dulaney said. Rose said these studies will allow students with disabilities to be seen just as other minorities are seen. “These are really important issues of human diversity, and just like race, class, gender and sexual orientation, it’s really important that students with disabilities see themselves in their course materials in ways that are not just purely negative,” Rose said. History associate professor Elisabeth Cawthon will be teaching one of the new classes, History of Madness and Mental Illness. “It seems to me that since that’s an area of interest for me, and I know it’s an area of interest for my students, that it would fit beautifully in disability studies,” Cawthon said. Cawthon said it’s more than just offering a new class, but offering understanding among students. “To me, it’s critical to understand that mental illness is a form of disability,” Cawthon said. “That’s a form of disability that actually a lot of people have not recognized as a disability in a legal sense until very recently.” Computer engineering junior Suhail Ahmed said he is glad the university is offering this minor. “The place where I’m from, they don’t care about people with disabilities,” he said. “We should be knowledgeable about these things and everyone needs to know about it.” Rose said the studies will go beyond the actual disability and look at the social and cultural studies. “What disability studies does is look at disabilities as something that is culturally and socially created,” Rose said. “Part of it is to provide students with disabilities, as well as many students that have relatives with disabilities, experience in studying these issues.”