Interdisciplinary Notes on the Dual Nature of Disability: Disrupting Ideology–Ontology Circuits in Racial Disparities Research

Abstract

Research on racial and linguistic disparities in disability identification must be grounded on the dual nature of disability as an object of protection and a tool of stratification. This dual nature requires a situated research approach to understand the stratifying power of disability—Who is targeted? Where? How? By whom and to what consequences? I contrast this perspective with the traditional research approach that privileges a deficit and colorblind framing of racial disparities. The application of a colorblind ideology enables researchers to envision students of color as innately damaged and in need of remediation; thus, forming ideology–ontology circuits. I offer three strategies to disrupt these circuits in future learning disabilities research, namely the elimination of colorblind research strategies, the adoption of a historical imagination, and the discontinuation of Black and Brown abstractions.