History of DSE
I.
Before DSE: The Society for Disability Studies (SDS)
The Society for Disability Studies (SDS), an interdisciplinary scholarly organization devoted to disability studies, was organized in 1988. Through most of the 1990's, it remained the clearinghouse of disability studies in the U.S. with its annual conferences and its journal, Disability Studies Quarterly. Three Disability Studies in Education members--Phil Ferguson, Susan Gabel, and Susan Peters--were active in disability studies during the 1990s and their presence kept educational research visible within the U.S. disability studies community. Educators also provided leadership within SDS: Phil Ferguson is a past President of SDS and Susan Gabel is a past Secretary. While all three individuals were also special educators by profession, SDS provided a place where they could experiment with the intersections of disability studies and educational research. By the late 1990's several other DSE members became involved in the SDS annual conferences, including Beth Ferri, Linda Ware, Nancy Rice and others, and currently educational research has a more visible place on the annual program, indicating the deepening of links between critical special education (and other forms of educational research) and disability studies [http://www.uic.edu/orgs/sds/]. Other scholars have been foundational to the development of DSE, while not being formally affiliated, including: James Patton, Tom Skrtic, Carol Christensen, Dorothy Kerzner Lipsky, Alan Gartner, and Dianne Ferguson.
II. Connecting With the International Community in Disability Studies; Receiving Recognition in the United States
During the 1990s, disability research using a post-positivist lens by critical special educators had been evolving in parts of Europe, Australia, and New Zealand. Many scholars were members of an organization called the International Council in Inclusive Education (ICIE). In June 1999 Linda Ware, with the support of a Spencer grant, organized an international conference in Rochester, New York, bringing many of these scholars together for the first time in the U.S. This forum allowed the continuation of nascent re-workings toward disability studies in education as it was represented across the Atlantic and Pacific, and in the United States. Ellen Brantlinger was the keynote speaker at the conference; others included Julie Allen, Len Barton, Tony Booth, Sally Tomlinson, Roger Slee, Keith Ballard, Lous Heshusius, and Tom Skrtic, along with a large sampling of graduate students. This conference encouraged continued international engagement with disability studies among educators as characterized in the recently published Ideology and the Politics of (In)Exclusion (2004), an international collection of essays by educational researchers edited by Linda.
In addition to the Spencer-supported international conference, The National Endowment for the Humanities provided Linda funds to further the study of disability studies in education. A Disability Studies Seminar at the University of Rochester was held 2000-2001. Her research included the practical application of disability studies in classrooms, resulting in an article Writing, Identity, and the Other: Dare we do Disabilities Studies? published in Journal of Teacher Education (2001), and a collaborative study with secondary teachers, Working Past Pity: What We Make of Disability in Schools in Julie Allan's edited book, Inclusion, Participation and Democracy: What's the Purpose? (2003). Finally, in 2004 a Summer Institute was conducted by Linda, David Mitchell, and Sharon Snyder at University of Chicago, exploring theoretical and practical applications of disability studies in education [http://www.neh.gov]
III. Critical Beginnings
of DSE
While Disability Studies has grown as an interdisciplinary academic field
of inquiry, Disability Studies in Education is a relatively new phenomenon.
In December 1999, Scot Danforth submitted a proposal to the national conference
of TASH (The Association for Severely Handicapped) under the name of Coalition
for Open Inquiry in Special Education (COISE). At this meeting in Chicago,
Scot's co-presenters included Lous Heshusius, Ellen Brantlinger, Chris
Kliewer, and Phil Ferguson, and the title of the session was titled Ways
of Constructing Lives and Disabilities: The Case for Open Inquiry. The
panel asked questions such as: Why should a person with a disability or
a teacher or a parent care what the academics say in their research and
writings? Why should you care about the seemingly distant and esoteric
writings in research journals and university textbooks? What is happening
in these words that makes a difference?
As five academic writers
and researchers, they discussed the social and political value of current
trends and developments in disability research and scholarship, exploring
the importance of inquiry and writing for persons concerned with the social
valuation and inclusion of persons with disabilities. In brief, they made
a case for "open inquiry," an expansion and diversification
of what is considered legitimate and valuable writing within special education
publications. In particular, they offered a critical response to special
education's fierce embrace of positivism as the foundational paradigm
in which the field was largely grounded. Positivism is, most simply, a
way of doing social science that attempts to imitate the ideology and
practices of the natural sciences. A supposed detached objectivity and
quantitative measurement are the considered pathways to "finding
the truth." Historically, this "hard science" brand of
social science has contributed to a series of unfortunate developments
in disability services:
(1) the assumption that disability is a primarily bio-physical phenomenon
consisting of a deficit condition existing "in" an individual
(2) the assumption that service professionals know better than persons with disabilities and family members what is best for a served individual
(3) the assumption
that diagnosed or labeled individuals should be separated from the mainstream
population for purposes of treatment.
Although alternative modes of inquiry and forms of scholarship have been
developed over the last thirty years, the field of special education remains
tightly constrained within the dominant positivist discourse. This is
often reflected in the bland, repetitive pages of the many national special
education journals and the numerous university texts. Non-positivist (e.g.
interpretivist, feminist, critical/Marxist, ethical, postmodern, literary,
disability studies, etc.) writings are often marginalized, pressed to
devalued fringes of the academic terrain.
In contrast to
the dominant, pervasive deficit-driven ideology of traditional special
education, these scholars sought to examine the ethical, social, and political
problems resulting from the domination of positivist writings in journals
and texts. More importantly, the panel explored alternative ways of envisioning,
writing about, and talking about the lives and possibilities of persons
with disabilities including many traditions of scholarship (social science,
humanities, arts, spiritual traditions, etc.) and the numerous voices
that have something to say about disability issues.
IV. Forming the DSE as a Special Interest Group of the American Education Research Association
At the 1999 Chicago TASH conference, a group of about thirty “discouraged” disability researchers (many involved in COISE) from the US, Canada, the UK, and other nations gathered together with the purpose of forging a new paradigm of research as an alternative to traditional special education thought. Conversation within the group revolved around questions such as: What should the group be called? Should it be affiliated with TASH, Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), or the American Education Research Association (AERA). As is customary, a group of academics could not easily agree on anything. However, Susan Gabel and Linda Ware urged those assembled that “Disability Studies” would be a good choice, and after discussion by the larger group, the name was agreed upon. Meanwhile, Susan informed those assembled that she had already submitted an application with that name to AERA to form a Special Interest Group (SIG). The group present--in retrospect now considered “the other half” of the DSE movement--was ready to proceed whether or not COISE decided to merge with the AERA SIG. After some discussion, the group agreed to adopt the name already on the AERA application filed by Susan, namely, Disability Studies in Education. [http://www.ced.ncsu.edu/2/dse/]
During the first official
DSE/SIG business meeting at 2000's AERA conference in New Orleans, Susan
Gabel presented a paper on what constituted disability studies. During
the subsequent year at AERA in Seattle, she also presented a paper that
elaborated upon the first. [Susan's paper].
Susan Gabel and Scot Danforth became the chairpersons for the first two years (2000-2002),
followed by Susan Peters and Robin Smith during the third and fourth years (2002-2004) and
Roger Slee and Nirmala Erevelles during the fifth and sixth years (2004-2006). Currently,
Deborah Gallagher and David Connor are the co-chairs for the seventh and eighth years
(2006-2008). In addition to the DSE chairpersons, program chairs have played a vital
role in initiating and maintaining a high quality of presentations in research related
to disability studies. Program chairs have been: Deborah Gallagher (2001); Robin Smith
and Kagendo Mutua (2002); Kagendo Mutua and Greg Beratan (2003); Greg Beratan and Nirmala
Erevelles (2004); Susan Peters, Ellen Brantlinger and Chrysoula Fantaousakis (2005); Beth
Ferry and Judith Castle-Bentley (2006); and Beth Ferri and Jan Valle (2007).
V. DSE Annual National Conference
Interest grew in how scholars such as Lous Heshusius, Phil Ferguson, Ellen Brantlinger, Scot Danforth, Susan Peters, and Susan Gabel sought to broaden the scope of conceptualizing disability and the ways in which that work could affect research, policy, and practice. In June 2001, a small, inaugural national conference titled Disability Studies in Education: Critical Reflections on the Themes of Policy, Practice, and Theory, was held in Chicago, hosted by National-Louis University, featuring Ellen Brantlinger, Scot Danforth, Susan Gabel, Lous Heshusius, Bill Rhodes, and Linda Ware as speakers. Coordinators Valerie Owen, Terry Jo Smith, and Paula Neville provided an opportunity for scholars and graduate students to present papers, listen to speakers, and discuss areas of common interest pertaining to disability studies and education. Due to the success of the conference, it became an annual event that attracted researchers, professors, teachers, and other individuals who actively sought changes in theory and practice within education and rehabilitation services for people with disabilities.
The conference also became a co-sponsored event, receiving support in the person of Ron Ferguson representing The Professional Development and Research Institute on Blindness at Louisiana Tech University. The second annual DSE conference (Education, Social Action, and the Politics of Disability) and third conference (Traversing the Chasm Between Disability Studies and Education) remained in Chicago, and the fourth conference (Reforming, Restructuring, Resisting in Special Education) was held in Ruston, Louisiana. At the first milestone of five years, D. Kim Reid, Jan Valle, and David Connor, coordinated a committee staff and students at Teachers College, Columbia University to host the 2005 conference: The 30 th Anniversary of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and its Impact on American Society.
Scholars in disability studies have been honored during these conferences. Senior scholar awards have been given to William Rhodes (2001), Susan Peters (2002), Lous Heshusius (2003), Ellen Brantlinger (2005), and J. Kim Reid (2006). Junior scholar awards have been given to Alicia Broderick (2002), Beth Ferri (2003), David Connor (2005), and Jan Valle (2006).
VI. Publications
In 2000, Information Age Publishers offered the SIG/DSE a journal. It was titled Disability, Culture, & Education, edited by Susan Gabel and Scot Danforth, with two issues published during its existence in 2002-- featuring articles by Nirmala Erevelles, Philip Ferguson, Christopher Kliewer and Donna Rascke, James L. Paul, Lous Heshusius, and David Skidmore. In addition, Scot Danforth and Susan Gabel were guest editors to an edition of Disability Studies Quarterly dedicated to Educational issues. Many papers presented at DSE conferences were published [http://www.dsq-sds.org/2004_spring_toc.html].
While short-lived, from the ashes of the journal, a book series emerged, with Susan Gabel and Scot Danforth as co-editors. The first three of the twelve book series are scheduled for publication in 2005-2006. Disability Studies in Education: Readings in Theory and Method edited by Susan Gabel was published in Fall 2005. The other two books are forthcoming: Reading Resistance: Discourses of Exclusion in Desegregation and Inclusion Debates by Beth Ferri and David Connor; Vital Questions in Disability Studies in Education, edited by Scot Danforth and Susan Gabel.
VII. Interdisciplinary Connections and Affiliations
In many ways, the history of the DSE may be seen as a coming together of critical special educators and disability studies. However, scholars in other areas have contributed to the landscape of disability studies in education. These scholars include, but are not limited to: Bernadette Baker in curriculum studies; Nirmala Erevelles in education foundations; and Steve Seldon in history of education. The interdisciplinary nature of disability studies in education mirrors the field of disability studies in general, and disability studies in education scholars often seek to have work published in diverse journals. See for example, Linda Ware's (2001-2) “A Moral Conversation on Disability: Risking the Personal in Educational Contexts,” in Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, Special Issue: Feminism and Disability, Parts I & II, edited by Eva Kittay, Anita Silvers & Susan Wendell.
VIII. Opportunities to Share Ideas
Many scholars have used the DSE as a venue in which to present their latest work whether in progress or recently completed, as well as host stimulating discussions about common areas of interest. Such scholars include, but are not limited to, Doug Biklen, Ron Ferguson, Beth Ferri, Deb Gallagher, Shelley Kinash, Paula Kluth, D. Kim Reid, Nancy Rice, Robin Smith, Edy Stoughton, Steve Taylor, and Linda Ware. In addition, doctoral students, undergraduate students, and professionals in the field of rehabilitation have all taken the opportunity to present in a supportive atmosphere.
Note: This brief history has been updated by Susan Peters. It was originally crafted for purposes of general information and posted on the 2005 DSE Conference website by David Conner. David notes: "While much has been included, much may have been excluded by virtue of the purpose and length of this piece." If anyone has been inadvertently omitted, please let David Connor know and this will be rectified as soon as possible. David J. Connor at Davidjuan1@aol.com. ”Updates may also be directed to Susan Gabel at sgabel@nl.edu.
This brief history has been updated by Susan Gabel.