Deborah J. Gallagher

Disability Studies in Education The Need for a Plurality of Perspectives on Disability

This article asserts that the field of special education, historically founded on conceptions of disability originating within scientific, psychological, and medical frameworks, will benefit from acknowledging broader understandings of disability. Although well intended, traditional understandings of disability in special education have inadvertently inhibited the development of theory, limited research methods, narrowed pedagogical practice, and determined largely segregated policies for educating students with disabilities. Since the passage of P.L. 94-142, along with the growth of the Disability Rights Movements, meanings of disability have expanded and evolved, no longer constrained to the deficit-based medical model. For many individuals, disability is primarily best understood within social, cultural, and historical contexts. As career-long educators, the authors describe the emergence of Disability Studies in Education, illustrating ways it offers them the means to engage with longstanding tensions, limitations, and promises within their chosen field of special education—helping to reframe, accurately ground, and define their own research and practice. The authors call upon the field of special education to acknowledge and accept a greater plurality of perspectives about the nature of disability, recognizing the profound implications this raises for research, and viewing it as a welcome opportunity for ongoing dialogue.

Disability studies and inclusive education — implications for theory, research, and practice

This paper serves as a broad introduction to Disabilities Studies in Education (DSE). The emergence of DSE over the last decade has resulted in a vibrant area of academic scholarship as well as a critical forum for social/educational advocacy and activism. First, the authors trace the roots of DSE in the growth of disability studies (DS) within the UK and the USA. Second, they describe the formation of international networks dedicated to DSE. Third, they chart the evolution of DSE’s conceptual framework, complete with tenets and examples, carefully crafted over time by a community of scholars. Fourth, they comment upon twelve papers selected for this special double issue of the International Journal of Inclusive Education, highlighting the contribution of each toward both advancing and elucidating the tenets within the conceptual framework of DSE. Finally, the authors close with reflections on the significance of DSE, contemplating what it offers theorists, researchers, and practitioners, as well as highlighting future possibilities.

The Scientific Knowledge Base of Special Education: Do We Know What We Think We Know?

Leading scholars in special education acknowledge that the field has recently come under intense public criticism. Various defenses have been offered, including the lack of appropriate conditions under which to implement the knowledge base of special education. The nature of this knowledge base is examined, in particular the claim that special education possesses scientifically derived technologies. Specifically, a case is made that the term “science” is misused, and that the methods of empiricist science are inappropriately applied to study of special education. It is concluded that many, if not most, of the criticisms leveled at special education can be traced back to this misunderstanding of science. As a result, the field would do well to reconsider its philosophical ancestry.

Neutrality as a Moral Standpoint, Conceptual Confusion and the Full Inclusion Debate

Opposing perspectives on the full inclusion debate reveal a fundamental disjuncture between underlying conceptual frameworks. Advocates contend that full inclusion is a moral issue that cannot be resolved from a supposedly neutral scientific stance. Defenders of the traditional continuum of placements argue, to the contrary, that scientific research should be the dominant factor in arbitrating between separation and inclusion. In this paper, I examine the concept of scientific neutrality and its lack of tenability as a foundation for sorting out the full inclusion debate. Subsequently, I explore how the assumption of neutrality plays itself out in the context of specific argument against full inclusion and offer some clarification on the moral nature of the debate.

Pluralizing Methodologies in the Field of LD: From “What Works” to What Matters

The field of learning disabilities (LD) has a complex and complicated history. Tensions over definitions, eligibility criteria, service delivery models, and best practices, as well as epistemological debates, have been a part of that history from its inception. Given our collective struggles, as well as the current realities facing the field, there could not be a more critical moment for a conversation about how it is that we go about knowing what we know. In this concluding essay, we consider how, by focusing so intently on what works, we, as a field, may inadvertently lose sight of what matters. In other words, contrary to the push for narrowing what counts as evidence or knowledge, we examine the potential value in opening up the field to a more diverse range of methods for students who struggle academically. We also challenge taken-for-granted assumptions in the push toward evidence- or research-based practice. Finally, we highlight several compelling themes that we take away from the contributors of this special double issue.

Broadening our horizons: Toward a plurality of methodologies in learning disability research

This article serves as an introduction to a special double issue of the Learning Disability Quarterly that seeks to engage the field in a respectful exchange about the need to expand research methodologies. In this article, we identify three interrelated concepts of interest to researchers in the field of learning disabilities (LD) — learning, disability, and research — and examine how the cultural location(s) of each serve(s) to influence decisions about and possibilities for researching learning disabilities. Subsequently, we urge greater use of a plurality of methods than is reflected in traditional LD research, sharing examples of what knowledge is currently lost, minimized, disregarded, or omitted, while articulating examples of what could be gained. Finally, by relating research on LD to schools, classroom life, and individuals identified as having learning disabilities, we advocate for more responsive research and a greater acceptance of epistemic reflexivity within the LD research community.

An Essay on the Politics of Schooling and Educational Research

For a very long time, the process of schooling and the research on that process were thought of as above or beyond politics. The myth of a politics-free schooling was exposed beginning with the social movements of the 1960s. The myth of educational research as apolitical is now on its way to being exposed because of these movements and because of changes in our understandings of the nature of social and educational inquiry. The result of all of this has been so profound in the past few years that it is now clear that schools may be the most politicized institution in our society and, with the No Child Left Behind Legislation, governmental agencies now have a profound influence as to what is considered acceptable versus unacceptable educational research.

A response to Gustavsson, Kittelsaa & Tøssebro

The language of ‘evidence-based practices’projects an air of finality that serious questions about the scientific status of educational research have effectively been put to rest; and, having put those questions to rest, it follows that isolating ‘what works’ in educational practice is a simple matter of implementing detailed systematic reviews in order to separate the scientifically credible sheep from the unreliable goats of existing research on various interventions. From the outset, we must be clear, however, about what is promised and therefore reasonably expected from empiricist research with its much feted ‘gold standard’ randomised controls. In plain terms, this research methodology promises knowledge leading to predication and control such that if a teacher is ‘well-trained’ to use method A on student B it will result in the desired outcome. But such causality, despite great hopes, cannot be achieved (Brantlinger 1997), and this point has been elaborated on repeatedly by leading scholars who have elucidated the degree to which the entire evidence-based practices movement is awash in political and ideological commitments of profound consequence. Under the evidence-based practices framework, Mcdermott and Hall (2007) noted that the very attempt to depoliticise educational research is itself a political act that devitalises not only educational research, but also teacher education, pre-K through secondary curricula, the profession of teaching, and, most of all children who are, in their words, relegated to the status of ‘eunuchs of analysis’ (12). In the absence of being able to provide prediction and control, researchers supporting evidence-based practices might offer the counter argument that phrases such as ‘thought to be’ and ‘confident that the effect we see’ still offer predictive utility even though they are based on probabilistic generalisations rather than law-like generalisations. Arguments for the warrants of probabilistic generalisations or ‘regularities’ in educational research are not new, but only the incessant disregard of their methodological failings permits their repetition. Probabilistic generalisations in the natural sciences are simply not comparable to those claimed in randomised control group and quasi-experimental studies of educational research (for a more detailed explanation, see: Gallagher 2006). Despite implications to the contrary, the variables affecting student outcomes can neither be identified in their entirety nor can they be controlled, and because they cannot be completely identified and controlled (even in theory as they can be in the natural sciences), social sciences generalisations can be neither

The Politics of Legitimating Research: A Case with Commentary

In this essay, I centre on the field of special education predominantly in the United States to provide a case study illustrating Hodkinson’s micro/macro political analysis of the longstanding debate over research methodology.