Investigating the status of "The Pledge and Creed for Occupational Therapists"
A little over a year ago I presented an argument that the Emmanuel Movement provided important core values for the occupational therapy profession . This argument was constructed in context of a debate on whether or not Social Justice was a historical value of the profession. I was curious as to why we neglected to include the Emmanuel Movement when we discussed our values and beliefs. In the beginnings of the 20th century the Emmanuel Movement was based on the notion that a new method was required to address the social problems of disability and illness. That new method was a philosophy regarding responsibility and self reliance - and surrounded by Christian values of charity. Furthermore, that method was most certainly not based on a governmental model of redistribution or in a new age construct of oppression and liberation. That fact is what made some of the recent social justice debates so curious. Shannon (1977) warned that "a discipline that forgets...