African Renaissance as a Premise for Reimagined Disability Studies in Africa

Abstract

Disability studies globally is concerned, in various ways, with questions of systemic injustices and inequities that persons with disabilities are subjected to. Persons with disabilities are often positioned as the objects of research rather than equal thinkers and knowledge bearers in their own right. These issues are amplified in the context of African societies, where access is even more challenging than in wealthier countries, and many persons with disabilities are excluded from education altogether. This situation reinforces their epistemic vulnerability. As such, there is limited work on doing disability research from the frame of reference of those in these African societies. This article operates at the nexus of two scholarly traditions. The first of these is the field of disability studies, which is generally dominated by Global North thinking than ideas and experiences from the Global South, and which has addressed questions of knowledge and participation quite extensively, but most commonly in high-income countries. The second is the long-standing political and epistemological African Renaissance lens for understanding and rebelling against imperialism and neo-colonial advances in formerly colonized African societies. I integrate and engage these two scholarly traditions to contribute to charting possibilities of what critical disability studies might look like and mean, from the premise of an African Renaissance. Central to this discussion is building on African theorization while also challenging the dominating and hegemonic white-centric theorization that dominates the field and epistemology in general.

Challenges and opportunities of centring the African voice in disability research

“…This exclusion from the acquisition of knowledge has direct implications for the opportunities for people with disabilities to participate adequately in the production and dissemination of research. People with disabilities are often positioned as the objects of research rather than equal thinkers and knowledge bearers in their own right (Ned 2022). Furthermore, lack of access to education limits the forms of activities that they can engage in as a means of livelihood generation.…”

“…There is ample evidence in historical records that scholarship is often used to set parameters for the exclusion and even, sometimes, annihilation of groups of people who are deemed undesirable by society (Ned 2022). Scholarship provides an appeal to authority that may not always be.…”

“…It is indisputable that there is limited disability research from the frame of reference of people in these African societies and the broader Global South (Ned 2022). Although the picture is changing (with this journal being an example), the field of disability studies is still characterised by the dominance of ideas from the Global North to the exclusion of experiences and knowledges of those in the Global South (Ned 2022). Historically, African countries have, in many ways, been portrayed as marginal and irrelevant to the dominant sites of knowledge production in the Global North (Comaroff & Comaroff 2015;eds.…”

“…Historically, African countries have, in many ways, been portrayed as marginal and irrelevant to the dominant sites of knowledge production in the Global North (Comaroff & Comaroff 2015;eds. Grech & Soldatic 2016;Ned 2022;Owusu-Ansah & Mji 2013;Swartz 2018). In many of these countries, people with disabilities have been subjected to social, economic, political, cultural, epistemic and spatial exclusion.…”

“…This is evident in countries like South Africa where, as Ned (2022) puts it, disability research and provision have been historically interlinked with the hierarchical racialised power which has informed issues of access and use. For this reason, attempts to redress the inequalities and inequities in disability knowledges in South Africa and the African continent broadly necessitate engagement with the much broader question of power (Ned 2022). The implications of the dominance of Global North thinking in disability studies have far-reaching consequences.…”