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Critical disability studies and socially just change in higher education
Author(s) -
Liasidou Anastasia
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
british journal of special education
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.349
H-Index - 38
eISSN - 1467-8578
pISSN - 0952-3383
DOI - 10.1111/1467-8578.12063
Subject(s) - inclusion (mineral) , special education , race (biology) , disability studies , social justice , order (exchange) , sociology , higher education , pedagogy , economic justice , disabled people , learning disability , psychology , gender studies , political science , social science , developmental psychology , law , life style , demography , finance , economics
Social justice is an ambiguous and contested term that is evoked in order to address issues of enhancing participation and eliminating discrimination across various markers of difference linked to race, social class, and so on. Historically, disability has been excluded from these analyses because it has been cast in the sphere of abnormality and individual pathology. Notwithstanding considerable progress in the widening participation of disabled individuals in higher education, there are still many issues that need to be addressed in order to remove barriers to inclusion and to eradicate discriminatory regimes. The article, by A nastasia L iasidou of the E uropean U niversity C yprus, uses some insights from Critical Disability Studies in order to highlight the ways in which certain dimensions of a social justice discourse need to be incorporated into debates about widening participation in higher education on the grounds of disability. Considerable emphasis is placed on the importance of adopting the theoretical and pedagogical underpinnings of Universal Design for Learning ( UDL ) as a means to mobilising socially just changes in higher education.