Uncharted Territory: Delving into Unexplored Knowledge to Curb Ableism in Academia

Introduction

Language can reflect bias: an ‘intellectual’ disability means for many people that you cannot be an academic knowledge producer; a ‘learning’ disability means that your education will be hampered. Like language definitions, academic practices can reflect societal biases. The social (in)justice regarding knowledge and knowledge production is called epistemic injustice, and it has resulted in exclusion of nonconventional knowers, such as persons with intellectual or learning disabilities, from academia and higher education (other than as objects of research).

Methods

This paper will discuss academic practices through the lens of epistemic (in)justice and look at the potential of inclusive research and educational practices therein. We will briefly describe dominant ways of knowing (e.g., abstract, verbal), and counter these practices in exploring practical, tacit, embodied and affective ways of knowing.

Findings

For people with intellectual disabilities to be able to gain recognition as ‘real’ knowers within academia, we need to include diverse types of knowing and enable academic practices to be inclusive of people with intellectual disabilities. Inclusive practices can support a paradigm shift away from dominant ways of knowledge production in research and education, by centralising and correctly interpreting alternate knowledge. Experiences of scholars with intellectual disabilities appear to confirm the value of different ways of knowing.

Conclusions

Drawing from these experiences, we will discuss the importance of relational autonomy, collectively owned and adaptive knowledge, and the learning context.