RESEARCH TALK: Education of Linguistic Minorities with ASU Professor Alfredo Artiles

Transforming the Ontological Canon, Seeing What’s Off the Frame: A Research Program on the Racialization of Ability

In the time of global differences, the usual remedies applied to the repair of educational inequities fall short unless the cultural historical nature of identities and disciplinary research practices are taken into account.  A case in point is the racialization of ability as reflected in the disproportionate representation of racial minorities in special education. I will offer an overview of my interdisciplinary research program on this enduring problem. This work aims to (1) re-articulate the nature of the problem and (2) broaden research framings to study and address it. The problem’s canonical conceptualization calls for analyses of either individual traits or community variables to predict disability identification. I re-define the nature of this problem using two strategies, first, by making visible the historical entanglements of race and ability differences and, second, by producing evidence about the urgent need for disciplinary self-awareness in the study of race and ability differences (as is made clear, for example, in the problematic representation of culture and silence about race in the canonical empirical literature).  My goal has been to broaden the frames used to study the racialization of disabilities with a systematic consideration of spatial, temporal, and cultural forces involved. For instance, my recent work considers the geographical distribution of disabilities and educational opportunities and the roles of school and neighborhood ecologies. I conclude with a brief discussion of implications for policy and practice.

Alfredo J. Artiles is Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and the Ryan C. Harris Professor of Special Education at Arizona State University’s Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College. He directs the Equity Alliance and is affiliated faculty in the School of Transborder Studies and the School of Social Transformation. He has produced over 100 publications (journal articles, chapters, books) that aim to understand and address educational inequities related to the intersections of disability with sociocultural differences. His latest book is Inclusive education: Examining equity on five continents (Harvard Education Press, 2011) (with E. Kozleski & F. Waitoller). Dr. Artiles co-edits the International Multilingual Research Journal (Taylor & Francis) and Teacher College Press’ book series Disability, Culture, & Equity. He has obtained over $13 million dollars in grants that aim to advance policies, personnel preparation programs, and inclusive educational systems in multicultural contexts. Dr. Artiles was Vice President of AERA’s Division G. He is an AERA Fellow, a Spencer Foundation/National Academy of Education Postdoctoral Fellow, and a Resident Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (Stanford University). He received the 2012 Palmer O. Johnson Award for best article published in an AERA journal. Dr. Artiles has been an advisor to the Civil Rights Projects at Harvard University and UCLA, the National Academy of Education, the Council for Exceptional Children, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation, and numerous projects housed at universities in the U.S., Europe, and Latin America. He has held visiting professorships at Leibniz University (Germany), the University of Göteborgs (Sweden), the University of Birmingham (UK), and Universidad Rafael Landívar (Guatemala). He is a Commissioner in the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics. He was named 2009 Distinguished Alumnus by the University of Virginia’s Curry School of Education Foundation.