Postmodern synergistic knowledge creation: extending the boundaries of disability studies

Simmons, B, Blackmore, T and Bayliss, P (2008) 'Postmodern synergistic knowledge creation: extending the boundaries of disability studies.' Disability & Society, 23 (7). pp. 733-745. ISSN 0968-7599

Official URL: http://doi.org/10.1080/09687590802469222

Abstract

The tensions between the competing discourses of the medical and the social models of disability have traditionally provided a platform for discussion and research in the fields of disability studies and special needs education. Over the last 30 years a wealth of literature has consolidated the debate and produced particular knowledge of impairment and disability. In this paper we argue that by privileging notions of ‘deficit’ within these medical or social model perspectives the richness of the lived experience of people with impairments is denied. The individual becomes lost within a framework of medical symptoms or social inequalities. This paper considers alternative approaches which reveal a fuller picture of the lives of people with impairments. The authors conducted two separate empirical studies, one employing a Deleuzo‐Guattarian perspective, the other a Bourdieusian perspective. In this paper we illustrate how these theories of practice can reveal situated understandings of the individual with impairments and his/her daily life. By embracing new understandings and different theoretical perspectives we show how new knowledge can emerge to illuminate the fluid and ever‐changing notions of ‘disability’, ‘inclusion’ and ‘exclusion’, which form elements of the individual lived experience of the research participants.

Item Type: Article
Keywords: Deleuze, inclusion, profound and multiple learning difficulties, Bourdieu, post‐modern, narratives
Divisions: School of Education
Identification Number: https://doi.org/10.1080/09687590802469222
Date Deposited: 11 Apr 2018 15:31
Last Modified: 15 Aug 2021 09:49
URI / Page ID: https://researchspace.bathspa.ac.uk/id/eprint/10942
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