Hermeneutical Justice: A Mad Studies Heuristic for Children With Emotional and Behavioral Disorders

• In Event: Whose Truth? Theoretical Considerations for Disability Studies in Education

Abstract

We examine the identity and agency of parents/caregivers and children who have either been referred or are in pre-referral processes for special education under the federal disability category of emotional disturbance (EBD). We analyze semi-structured interviews through a Mad Studies lens and apply Miranda Fricker’s concept of hermeneutical in/justice (2007) to reframe a child’s behavior and emotional experiences away from abnormal and toward agentic. We center the ways parents/caregivers and children, themselves, participate in the social interpretation of behavior and emotional experiences in school. Findings indicate participants experience pathologization masked as “support,” resulting in affective interactions with procedural responses to student emotion and behavior.

Authors

• Maureen Negrelli Coomer, Colorado College
  Presenting Author

• Kathleen A. King Thorius, Indiana University - Purdue University at Indianapolis
  Presenting Author

• Colleen M. Campbell, Colorado College
  Presenting Author