Meeting Families Where They Are

Beth Harry is a professor of special education and chair of the Department of Teaching and Learning at the University of Miami, and coauthor of Why Are So Many Minority Students in Special Education? Second Edition. Lydia Ocasio-Stoutenburg is a doctoral candidate at the University of Miami.

• Acknowledgments vii1. Constructing Meanings of Human Difference at the Intersections of Identity: Personal and Conceptual Considerations 1The Authors' Lenses 3DisCrit: A Lens for Viewing Family and Community Intersections 4The Co-Construction of Advocacy 8Overview of the Book 8Qualitative Vignettes and Authors' Reflections 102. Parent Advocacy and the Challenge of Difference 13Personal Perspectives 14Goals and Avenues of Advocacy  16Why Advocacy for the Value of the Child? 183. Constructing Race and Disabilities as Intrinsic Differences: A Cultural-Historical View 25"Intrinsic" Attributions: From the Supernatural to Science 25Conquest, Slavery, and Colonization: The Intertwining of Race, Disability, and "Normality" 28Families with Developmentally Disabled Children in the 19th Century 32The 20th Century: The Hegemony of Intelligence as a Measurable Construct 36The 20th Century and the Disempowerment of Parents 424. Parent Voices Rising: Challenging Constructions of Difference 49Advocacy and the Judges 49Parents' Published Narratives 51The Emergence of Advocacy Organizations 59Exposing the Institutions 655. The Social Construction of Humanness 71The Meaning of Disability 75The Painful Contours of Parent Advocacy 776. Advocacy Toward the EHA: Converging Interests and Intersections 93Parent Advocacy: The Law as the Vehicle 93The Construction of Disability Under the Law 96The Label as a Negotiating Tool 102The Label as Exclusion or Confusion 1077. Parent Advocacy Under the Umbrella of the EHA/IDEA 109Challenges of Racism, Ethnocentrism, and Context 110Parent Advocacy: The Law as the Obstacle 1258. Reframing Advocacy, Repositioning the Advocate 139De-Constructing Advocacy 140Revisiting Our Guiding Principles 145Co-Constructing Advocacy: Developing a New Model 151Forging Ahead 157The Next Chapter 158References 161Index 175About the Authors 184

“Harry and Ocasio-Stoutenburg (both, Univ. of Miami) combine academic expertise with personal experience as parents of children with disabilities in this informative and emotionally driven work. The book provides a qualitative examination of the treatment of children with disabilities and their families using an intersectional approach through the lens of ‘DisCrit,’ a combination of disability studies and critical race theory. Though the volume is intended for educators and academics, it also provides hope, suggestions, and a look into oppressive societal structures that would be useful for parents who advocate for their own disabled children.”—CHOICE