Beyond spatial materiality, towards inter- and intra-subjectivity: conceptualizing exclusion in education as internalized ableism and psycho-emotional disablement

Abstract

Of the little written about educational exclusion, much of it considers exclusion as disabled students experiencing less access, opportunities and participation in education when compared to their nondisabled same-aged peers. Our article aims to move beyond these narrow, parochial, and reductive postulates by centering the inter- and intra-subjectivities of disabled students to conceptualize exclusion as experiences with internalized ableism and psycho-emotional disablement that may (or may not) be experienced in any or all material and social spaces in education. We cast light on ableism and psycho-emotional disablement in education so that we and others can challenge, disrupt, and transform it given that it can impact negatively on the wellbeing of disabled students. We end by encouraging researchers to explore how ableism permeates the ideologies, discourses, logics, and traditions of education systems, and for policy makers, school leaders, and teachers to experience anti-disablism training and to adopt an anti-ableist perspective.