Exploring Some Missing Dimensions: Ethics, Power, and Privilege in the Education of African American Learners With Disabilities and Gifts and Talents

Abstract

This special compilation of articles in Teacher Education and Special Education follows an initial article recently published by Patton and Townsend that addressed issues of ethics, power, and privilege within the context of educating African American learners with disabilities and gifts and talents. The increased cultural, racial, and gender homogeneity of the teaching, administrative, counseling and related services, and teacher education personnel, concomitant with the increased cultural, ethnic, and class diversity of exceptional learners, has created a compelling need to explore more closely these three critical issues. We believe that this special collection of articles provides us with a systematic view of the role these three variables have played in the education of African American learners and the path educators can follow in order to incorporate properly these perspectives into their practice and research.