Children with Special Needs: A Postmodern Perspective

Abstract

This article describes and analyzes changing concepts of childhood and of special needs education in what the author sees as two distinct eras: the modern, from the seventeenth century through the Second World War, and the postmodern, beginning in the middle of the twentieth century. Tracing and evaluating theories, views, and discoveries of a host of scientists and philosophers from Hobbes to Freud to Erikson, David Elkind defines the postmodern era as the time when childhood was reinvented, and submits that this reinvention included children with physical special needs. The philosophical/scientific shift to inclusionism has been largely responsible for the passage of legislation that insures a free and public education for all children. It has resulted in the reinvention of classroom organization (mainstreaming); the development of the concept of individually appropriate practice; and the broadening of the classification of conduct and emotional disorders.