Infusing Disability Studies into “Mainstream” Educational Thought: One Person’s Story
Main Article Content
Keywords
Education and disability studies, in-service, secondary education
Abstract
The purpose of this article is to explore how ideas from disability studies can inform “mainstream” educational practice. In this autoethnographic narrative I describe a personal journey of planning, teaching, and evaluating a 3-hour “in service” presentation for high school principals. In my account of this event I alternate between a description of the content, my personal reflections, and participant reactions. I demonstrate how the content and format of this kind of presentation can serve as a formalized context for generating a much needed dialogue between disability studies and current practices in the field of education.
References
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Banks, Stephen P., and Anna Banks. 2000. Reading “The critical life”: Autoethnography as pedagogy. Communication Education 49: 233-238.
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954).
Bullough, Robert V., and Stefinee Pinnegar. 2001. Guidelines for quality in autobiographical forms of self-study research. Educational Researcher 30: 13-21.
Clandinin, D. Jean, and F. Michael Connelly. 2000. Narrative inquiry: Experience and story in qualitative research. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
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Corker, Mairian and Tom Shakespeare. 2002. Mapping the terrain. In Disability/Post-modernity, edited by M. Corker & T. Shakespeare. London: Continuum.
Crawford, Lyall. 1996. Personal ethnography. Communication Monographs 63: 158-170.
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Delpit, Lisa. 1995. Other people’s children. New York: The New Press.
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Elba-Luwisch, Freema. 1997. Narrative research: Political issues and implications. Teaching and Teacher Education 13: 75-83.
Ellis, Carolyn. 1997. Evocative autoethnography: Writing emotionally about our lives. In Representation and the text, edited by W.G. Tierney and Y.S. Lincoln. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Ellsworth, Elizabeth. 1989. Why doesn’t this feel empowering? Working through the repressive myths of critical pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review, 59: 297-324.
Fairbanks, Colleen M. 1996. Telling stories: Reading and writing research narratives. Journal of Curriculum and Supervision 11: 320-340.
Ferri, B. A., Keefe, C. A., & Gregg, N. 2001. Teachers with learning disabilities: A view from both sides of the desk. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 34: 22-32.
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Foucault, Michel. 1980. Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972-77. New York: Pantheon Books.
Foucault, Michel. 1994. The birth of the clinic: An archeology of medical perception. New York: Vintage Books.
Freire, Paolo. 1970. Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Continuum.
Gabel, Susan L. 2001. “I wash my face with dirty water”: Narratives of disability and pedagogy. Journal of Teacher Education, 52: 31-47.
Gardner, Allan. and Dorothy Kerzner Lipsky. 1987. Beyond special education: Toward a quality system for all students. Harvard Educational Review, 57: 367-395.
Geertz, Clifford. 1988. Works and lives: The anthropologist as author. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Gould, Stephen J. 1996. The mismeasure of man. New York: Norton.
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Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) of 1991, P.L. 105-17. U.S. Department of Education, Washington DC.
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Karagiannis, Anastasios. 2000. Soft disability in schools: Assisting or confining at risk children and youth? Journal of Educational Thought, 34: 113-134.
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Lather, Patti. 1992. Critical frames in educational research: Feminist and post-structural perspectives. Theory into Practice, 31: 87-99.
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Oliver, Michael. 1996. Understanding disability: From theory to practice. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
Patton, S., & Mondale, S. (Producers). 1989. School: the story of American public education [television series]. Princeton, New Jersey: Films for the Humanities & Sciences.
Pelkey, Lynn. 2001. In the LD bubble. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
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Proctor, Robert N. 1995. The destruction of “lives not worth living.” In Deviant bodies: Critical perspectives on difference in science and popular culture, edited by J. Terry & J. Urla. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Reid, D. Kim, and Linda J. Button. 1995. Anna’s story: Narratives of personal experience about being labeled learning disabled. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 28: 602-614.
Richardson, Laurel. 1994. Writing: A method of inquiry. In Handbook of qualitative research, edited by N.K. Denzin and Y.K. Lincoln. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage.
Rodis, P., Garrod, A., & Boscardin, M. L., eds. 1989. Learning disabilities & life stories. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Sapon-Shevin, M. 1996. Full inclusion as disclosing tablet: Revealing the flaws in our present system. Theory Into Practice, 35: 35-41.
Shakespeare, Tom. 1994. Cultural representations of disabled people. Disability and Society, 9: 283-299.
Shapiro, Joseph P. 1993. No pity. New York: Three Rivers Press.
Skrtic, Thomas. 1991. Behind special education: A critical analysis of professional culture and school organization. Colorado: Love Publishing House.
Sparks, Dennis. 1994. A paradigm shift in staff development. Journal of Staff Development, 15: 26-29.
Tierney, William G. 1997. Lost in translation: Time and voice in qualitative research. In Representation and the text, edited by W.G. Tierney and Y.S. Lincoln. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Titchkosky, Tanya. 2002. Cultural maps: Which way to disability? In Disability/postmodernity, edited by M. Corker and T. Shakespeare. London: Continuum
Varenne, Herve, and Ray McDermott, R. 1998. Successful failure: The schools America builds. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Valle, Jan & Aponte, Elsie. 2002. IDEA and collaboration: A Bakhtinian perspective on parent and professional discourse. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 35: 469-479.
Vee, Nelson. 2001. Riding the drug and alcohol train. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Ware, Linda. 2001. Writing, identity, and the other: Dare we do disabilities studies? Journal of Teacher Education, 52: 107-123.
Wendell, Susan. 1999. Feminism, disability, and the transcendence of the body. In Feminist Theory and the Body: A Reader, edited by J. Price & M. Shildrick. NY: Routledge.
Wendell, Susan. (2001). Unhealthy disabled: Treating chronic illnesses as disabilities, Hypatia, 16: 17-33.
Amos, Oris Elizabeth and Mary Frances Landers. 1984. Special education and multicultural education: A compatible marriage. Theory into Practice, 13: 144-150.
Anderson, Lorin W. 1997. The stories teachers tell and what they tell us. Teaching and Teacher Education 13: 131-136.
Bahktin, Mikhail M. 1981. The dialogic imagination: Four essays by M.M. Bakhtin. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.
Banks, Stephen P., and Anna Banks. 2000. Reading “The critical life”: Autoethnography as pedagogy. Communication Education 49: 233-238.
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954).
Bullough, Robert V., and Stefinee Pinnegar. 2001. Guidelines for quality in autobiographical forms of self-study research. Educational Researcher 30: 13-21.
Clandinin, D. Jean, and F. Michael Connelly. 2000. Narrative inquiry: Experience and story in qualitative research. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Corker, Mairian. 1998. Disability discourse in the postmodern world. In The Disability Reader, edited by T. Shakespeare. London: Cassell.
Corker, Mairian and Tom Shakespeare. 2002. Mapping the terrain. In Disability/Post-modernity, edited by M. Corker & T. Shakespeare. London: Continuum.
Crawford, Lyall. 1996. Personal ethnography. Communication Monographs 63: 158-170.
Davis, Lennard J. 1995. Constructing normalcy. In Enforcing Normalcy, Disability, Deafness, and the Body, edited by L.J. Davis. New York: Verso.
Delpit, Lisa. 1995. Other people’s children. New York: The New Press.
Doyle, Walter. 1997. Heard any really good stories lately? A critique of the critics of narrative in educational research. Teaching and Teacher Education 13: 93-99.
Elba-Luwisch, Freema. 1997. Narrative research: Political issues and implications. Teaching and Teacher Education 13: 75-83.
Ellis, Carolyn. 1997. Evocative autoethnography: Writing emotionally about our lives. In Representation and the text, edited by W.G. Tierney and Y.S. Lincoln. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Ellsworth, Elizabeth. 1989. Why doesn’t this feel empowering? Working through the repressive myths of critical pedagogy. Harvard Educational Review, 59: 297-324.
Fairbanks, Colleen M. 1996. Telling stories: Reading and writing research narratives. Journal of Curriculum and Supervision 11: 320-340.
Ferri, B. A., Keefe, C. A., & Gregg, N. 2001. Teachers with learning disabilities: A view from both sides of the desk. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 34: 22-32.
Foucault, Michel. 1977. Intellectuals and power. In Language, counter-memory, practice, edited by D.F. Bouchard. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press.
Foucault, Michel. 1980. Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings, 1972-77. New York: Pantheon Books.
Foucault, Michel. 1994. The birth of the clinic: An archeology of medical perception. New York: Vintage Books.
Freire, Paolo. 1970. Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York: Continuum.
Gabel, Susan L. 2001. “I wash my face with dirty water”: Narratives of disability and pedagogy. Journal of Teacher Education, 52: 31-47.
Gardner, Allan. and Dorothy Kerzner Lipsky. 1987. Beyond special education: Toward a quality system for all students. Harvard Educational Review, 57: 367-395.
Geertz, Clifford. 1988. Works and lives: The anthropologist as author. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Gould, Stephen J. 1996. The mismeasure of man. New York: Norton.
Gudmundsdottir, Sigrun. 1997. Introduction to the theme issue of “narrative perspectives on research on teaching and teacher education”. Teaching and Teacher Education 13:1-3.
Guskey, Thomas R. and Michael Huberman, eds. 1995. Professional development in education. Teachers College Press: New York.
Hampton, Henry and Steve Fayer. 1990. Voices of freedom: An oral history of the civil rights movement from the 1950s through the 1980s. New York: Bantam.
Hooks, Bell. 1994. Teaching to transgress. New York: Routledge.
Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA) of 1991, P.L. 105-17. U.S. Department of Education, Washington DC.
Johnson, Mark. 1987. The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination, and reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Karagiannis, Anastasios. 2000. Soft disability in schools: Assisting or confining at risk children and youth? Journal of Educational Thought, 34: 113-134.
King, Joyce E. 1991. Dysconscious racism: Ideology, identity, and the miseducation of teachers. Journal of Negro Education, 60: 133-146.
Kumashiro, Kevin. 2000. Toward a theory of anti-oppressive education. Review of Educational Research, 70: 25-54.
Lather, Patti. 1992. Critical frames in educational research: Feminist and post-structural perspectives. Theory into Practice, 31: 87-99.
Lincoln, Yvonna S. 1997. Self, subject, audience, text: Living at the edge, writing at the margins. In Representation and the text, edited by W.G. Tierney and Y.S. Lincoln. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Linton, Simi. 1998. Claiming disability. New York: New York University Press.
Lipsky, Dorothy Kerzner, and Allan Gartner, A. 1997. Inclusion and school reform: Transforming America’s classrooms. Maryland: Paul H. Brookes.
Marshall, Kevin. 2001. I will not succumb to obstacles. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Mitchell, David T., and Sharon Snyder. 2000. Narrative prosthesis: Disability and the dependencies of discourse. Michigan: University of Michigan Press.
Morris, Jenny. 2001. Unhealthy disabled: Treating chronic illnesses as disabilities. Hypatia, 16: 1-16.
O’Connor, Gretchen. 2001. Bad. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Oliver, Michael. 1996. Understanding disability: From theory to practice. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
Patton, S., & Mondale, S. (Producers). 1989. School: the story of American public education [television series]. Princeton, New Jersey: Films for the Humanities & Sciences.
Pelkey, Lynn. 2001. In the LD bubble. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Piziali, Aaron. 2001. Revolution. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Proctor, Robert N. 1995. The destruction of “lives not worth living.” In Deviant bodies: Critical perspectives on difference in science and popular culture, edited by J. Terry & J. Urla. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Reid, D. Kim, and Linda J. Button. 1995. Anna’s story: Narratives of personal experience about being labeled learning disabled. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 28: 602-614.
Richardson, Laurel. 1994. Writing: A method of inquiry. In Handbook of qualitative research, edited by N.K. Denzin and Y.K. Lincoln. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage.
Rodis, P., Garrod, A., & Boscardin, M. L., eds. 1989. Learning disabilities & life stories. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Sapon-Shevin, M. 1996. Full inclusion as disclosing tablet: Revealing the flaws in our present system. Theory Into Practice, 35: 35-41.
Shakespeare, Tom. 1994. Cultural representations of disabled people. Disability and Society, 9: 283-299.
Shapiro, Joseph P. 1993. No pity. New York: Three Rivers Press.
Skrtic, Thomas. 1991. Behind special education: A critical analysis of professional culture and school organization. Colorado: Love Publishing House.
Sparks, Dennis. 1994. A paradigm shift in staff development. Journal of Staff Development, 15: 26-29.
Tierney, William G. 1997. Lost in translation: Time and voice in qualitative research. In Representation and the text, edited by W.G. Tierney and Y.S. Lincoln. Albany: State University of New York Press.
Titchkosky, Tanya. 2002. Cultural maps: Which way to disability? In Disability/postmodernity, edited by M. Corker and T. Shakespeare. London: Continuum
Varenne, Herve, and Ray McDermott, R. 1998. Successful failure: The schools America builds. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Valle, Jan & Aponte, Elsie. 2002. IDEA and collaboration: A Bakhtinian perspective on parent and professional discourse. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 35: 469-479.
Vee, Nelson. 2001. Riding the drug and alcohol train. In Learning disabilities & life stories, edited by P. Rodis, S. Garrod, and M.L. Boscardin. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Ware, Linda. 2001. Writing, identity, and the other: Dare we do disabilities studies? Journal of Teacher Education, 52: 107-123.
Wendell, Susan. 1999. Feminism, disability, and the transcendence of the body. In Feminist Theory and the Body: A Reader, edited by J. Price & M. Shildrick. NY: Routledge.
Wendell, Susan. (2001). Unhealthy disabled: Treating chronic illnesses as disabilities, Hypatia, 16: 17-33.
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Dec 29, 2014
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Author Biography
David J. Connor, Department of Curriculum and Teaching Teachers College, Columbia University
David J. Connor is a full time professional development specialist in New York City public schools. He is also a part time instructor and doctoral candidate at Teachers College, Columbia University. His dissertation is on the life experiences of working class Black and/or Latino/a urban youth labeled learning disabled. Connor would like to thank Dr. Susan Gabel, National Louis University, Chicago, for her insightful comments and helpful suggestions made during an earlier draft of this article.
Correspondence regarding this manuscript should be sent to 209 9th Ave., Apt. 13D, New York, NY 10001, TEL: 212-989-9428, [email protected].