Impure, Unbeautiful, Unfit: DisCrit, Dis/ablement, and Segregation in Special Education

• In Event: Intersections of Race and Ability: Examining the Education of Students of Color With Dis/abilities in Charter Schools

Abstract

Objective
This presentation frames the symposium in a critical culturally relevant pedagogy (CCRP) framework that brings together critical race theory (CRT), disability studies, and culturally relevant pedagogy (CRP). Inspired by the work of Annamma (2016) and Brown-Jeffy and Cooper’s (2011) marriage CRP and CRT, this presentation seeks to critically examine the intersections of race and ability.

Theoretical Framework
This presentation builds on CRP, CRT, and DisCrit. CRP, coined by Ladson-Billings (1995) is based on three tenets: (a) academic success; (b) cultural competence; and (c) critical consciousness through which students challenge the current social order. CRT, a theory coming from legal scholarship to education (Ladson-Billings, 1995), makes explicit the link between the roles of race and racism in shaping students’ schooling experiences. As Solorzano and Yosso (2000) summarized, “Critical Race Theory asks such questions as: What roles do schools, school processes, and school structures play in the maintenance of racial, ethnic, and gender subordination” (p. 42). DisCrit raises the question of race by dis/ability, suggesting that it is not mere biological fact. It argues that the deployment of dis/ability labels and research on representation by and within schools without regard for the effects of racialization in the identification and servicing of students of color with dis/abilities at the intersections of marginalizations compounds historical inequities towards historically underserved students (Annamma, Connor, & Ferri, 2013).

Modes of Inquiry & Data sources
This presentation draws on existing research literature in developing a broader framework for examining inequity in evidence related to educational policy, practice, and student educational experiences. It reviews extant data from previously published studies to ground its key claims that students from historically non-dominant racial, ethnic, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds are more often diverted into “special” (more restrictive) learning environments, often on the basis of their disproportionate representation among populations of students with “high incidence” disability classifications, such as LD, ED, and ID (Annamma, Connor, & Ferri, 2013; Erevelles, 2000; Ferri & Connor, 2006; Fierros & Conroy, 2002; Harry & Klingner, 2014; Losen & Orfield, 2002).

Findings
At the intersection of race and ability, critically culturally responsive educators can and often do resist institutional ‘racism x ableism’ by developing deep understandings of cultural differences between their students and them, as well as their own potential stereotypes about their students and their students’ dis/abilities. The way schools regard race and dis/ability can frequently advance and reinforce ableist and racist norms that preserve the interests of white, middle class privilege in education at the expense of vulnerable students who receive inferior educational opportunities despite equal or greater need (Annamma, Connor & Ferri, 2013). This practice calls educators to attend to (1) Identity and Achievement, (2) Student Teacher Relationships, (3) Equity & Excellence, (4) Developmental Appropriateness, and (5) Teaching the Whole Child (Brown-Jeffy & Cooper, 2011).

Scholarly Significance
This analysis eschews the traditional deficit-oriented pedagogies that pathologize difference as deficit and enables us to employ mindsets, practices, and actions for practices that empower students and provide opportunities that advantage more positive outcomes for underserved youth.

Author

• Evan Johnston, New York University