Deconstructing difference and inclusion in educational research: reflections on the international journal of qualitative studies in education special edition on difference

Abstract

Disabled and disability studies scholars and activists have challenged and are challenging the bio- and necro-politics of disability subjectivity through scholarship, art, activism, and online engagement. As this edition articulates, difference takes many forms, is intersectional, and is often characterized and codified by and through educational research. Acknowledging that difference is socially constructed poses challenges to the ablenationalism that undergirds not only complex systems of schooling, but the educational research on which these systems rest.

Keywords:

• Disabled epistemologies
• disability studies in education
• educational research
• critical disability studies

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

M. Nickie Coomer

M. Nickie Coomer is a Ph.D. Candidate at Indiana University-Purdue University (Indianapolis) in the Urban Education Studies doctoral program. Her research is in the social and cultural processes in schools that construct and maintain disability in special education.