To Be a Forethought: Disability, Care and the Promise of Inclusive Education By Neelanjna Singh

Nazi Germany, a staunch believer of eugenics believed that disability was an impediment, a weakness, on the society at large. Ableist, hostile and bigoted, Nazi Germany launched a euthanasia program that was destructive in more manners of one. While Nazi Germany ceases to exist, history serves us as an important reminder, to remember, grieve and prevent such incidents from ever occurring again. While narratives since Nazi Germany have evolved, the way disabled individuals are pitied upon and sympathised leads to exclusion under the guise of inclusion. Critical Disability studies steps in here, and view disability as both a lived reality in which the experiences of people with disabilities are central to interpreting their place in the world, and as a social and political definition based on societal power relations.(Reaume, 2014). What disability studies provide us with, is a paradigm shift. “Nothing about us without us” is the foundational principle of the disability rights movement, highlighting the need for centralisation of individuals with disabilities in matters that actually concern them. To be a forethought, and not an afterthought. 

The medical model views disability as a medical condition that requires medical intervention to improve quality of life, in contrast critical disability studies emphasises that impairment becomes a disability due to political unwillingness, cultural ignorance and multiple sociological problems. The individual doesn’t become disabled due to their impairments, but due to the inability to have mechanisms that consider these. Wolbring's(2006)  conception of ableism becomes important to note here, he defines Ableism is a system of beliefs, practices, and processes that assigns value to people based on their abilities ,  shaping how individuals understand themselves, their bodies, and their relationships with others while also determining how they are judged by the world around them.. This looks like ideas of speed, productivity, eye contact that able bodied people tend to. When assumptions of able bodied persons prevail, inaccessibility grows. Such conversations require the acknowledgment of privilege.

Privilege is questioned throughout the course, and not in the sense that privilege needs to be scorned upon but how do we use that privilege to change our definitions of inclusion, for privilege underscores the fact that equity is needed. Individuals with access to that privilege can be pioneers of an equitable environment, if they are aware of the barriers experienced. It's important to understand that this awareness exists in multitudes. Care ethics is a field of ethics in philosophy that talks extensively about the concept of care in ethical decision making. It posits that care is the most fundamental aspect of human relation and that care warrants us to care for and care about one another. It is the caring about others that makes us capable of change, for no change is elicited if we concern ourselves with just our individual needs.. Human beings are social, relational beings requiring awareness to move beyond the mechanistic way of being aware of the problem and then solving it. Inability to do the same, denies individuals with impairment the opportunity to access intimacy.  Access intimacy refers to unspoken connection between individuals who accommodate and understand each other's access needs. The feeling of comfort and care when someone “gets” your access needs makes daily life navigation easier. (Mingus, 2011) Access intimacy builds on our arguments of care, as Mia mingus highlights the feeling of access intimacy being a tool of liberation for intersectional impaired individuals.  Mia Mingus notes that access intimacy is a sense of safety experienced when access needs are met. Lack of this access intimacy creates mental barriers alongside structural. 

Education has been deemed to be the most powerful tool of liberation thus making it important to look at how educational spaces fare with regards to inclusion and liberation of disabled individuals. Dr Antonios Tnidis, seeks the same answer by posing three questions, “Who is the university designed for, Who feels safe in it and How can we reimagine these spaces”. These questions force reflection of institutions that remain unquestioned otherwise. This reflection makes us go back to ideas of ableism and how they show up in universities. Often ableism hides under bureaucratic red tape, and ideas that buildings are old but we will make a ramp. These attitudes deflect responsibility and look at individuals with disability as an afterthought. Providing a ramp may fit the access issues of one individual while ignoring those of many present, institutions apply a one size fits all solution and render the problem fixed.Universities, educational institutes have responsibilities to be inclusive, and through policies of affirmative action such as the inclusion of disability literature in educational courses, the RPWD act of 2016, slow and steady steps are being taken. Yet, are these steps performative and if so, what is the ground reality often like. Studies (Kulsum, 2025) reveal that the ground level implementation falls short of the ideas, with reservations being provided, yet universities having inaccessible accommodation, or the commute to universities being inaccessible. Dr. Karuna Rajev brings upon the adorno framework of education and violence that becomes relevant here. The key takeaway being that having inaccessible infrastructure is itself a form of structural violence, excluding people not through overt hatred but through silent expectations. 

If the spaces that have the potential to educate and eradicate such thought processes are exclusionary, then what can be done? 

While at an institutional level, acknowledgement of accountability and failures to accommodate individuals is of utmost importance, the retribution lies in the way issues are dealt with. To place individuals with disabilities at the centre of conversations regarding them brings us towards more accessible spaces. Institutions can adopt Universal Design , an approach that builds spaces and systems from the perspective of the most marginalized. This inherently requires acknowledging intersectionality in disability, which in turn creates room for disability gains the ingenious solutions disabled individuals develop to navigate the world to inform and enrich design for everyone.

Furthermore, it becomes really important to underscore the importance of an educator within these spaces and their impact.  Nel Noddings, a famous philosopher, talks about the concept of engrossment as essential in teaching spaces. Engrossment refers to being receptive and paying attention to the students with more depth (Noddings, 1984). Engrossment in educational spaces can help foster access intimacy for individuals. When basic needs such as safety are met, individuals can maximize their potential. Further, having discourse about ideas of normality are of extreme importance. Such discussions reveal that the concept of normality is nothing short of a myth, and often conceptualisations of normality remain very oppressive towards individuals from various communities.  Dr Tnidis and Rajev, highlight mechanisms that call for inclusion at the micro-level. These look like, not requiring to make eye contact, not being forced to sit still, freedom to engage in stimming or get distracted, and ideas such as comfort breaks. All these again adopt a universal design, and send a message that recognises individuals with disabilities and give them the space to exist with peace and comfort in environments. Further, Concepts such as Crip time that measure work on the basis of quality and impact instead of speed and efficiency provide more inclusion and reduce the pressure felt by individuals to meet “stereotypical ableist standards”.

Lord Byron, Frida Kahlo, Helen Keller are names that every individual is familiar with due their ability to reach great heights despite their disabilities limiting them. Ignorance of disability studies leads to these individuals being reduced to case studies of resilience and optimism. While their contributions remain enormous, it poses a question to the entirety of humanity? What more could they and many others like them have achieved if they had the support to. 

Education ultimately is the most fundamental right to an individual, the tool to empower, liberate themselves comes from education. Until these, acknowledge the gaps in their ideologies and their implementation, change is still secondary. The educational sector paves the way for the remaining world to follow through, and when these sectors start acknowledging the lack of structural mechanism is indeed what's disabling individuals with impairment, true liberation of all involved begins. 

References

Mingus, M. (2011). Access intimacy: The missing link. Leaving Evidence. https://leavingevidence.wordpress.com/2011/05/05/access-intimacy-the-missing-link/

Noddings, N. (1984). Caring: A feminine approach to ethics and moral education. University of California Press.

Kulsum, Syeda & Gopal, K Madan & Aggarwal, Arpita. (2025). Assessment of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 in India: A Comprehensive Study on Implementation and Impact.

Reaume, G. (2014). Understanding critical disability studies. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 186(16), 1248–1249.

Wolbring, G. (2006). The unenhanced underclass. In P. Miller & J. Wilsdon (Eds.), Better humans? The politics of human enhancement and life extension. Demos. Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, No. 49 of 2016 (India).