Three Reasons for Dealing with Disability, Education and the Majority World

Abstract

This chapter covers aspects of relevance for the topic regarding scientific, disciplinary and methodical relevance, political and developmental relevance (including educational equity) and terminological relevance. This illustrates the importance of the topic regarding the necessity of conducting research on disability, education and the majority world as well as research that includes disability and culture. Thereby, international developments and discussions about disabilityspecific issues (like discussions on inclusive education) are reflected. A final summary of these diverse aspects, which are all meaningful to this work, provides the reader with a first introduction to the topic in a broader framework. Last but not least, the chapter concludes by approaching the field with a question.The topic of interest for this research comprises a multitude of aspects such as disability, education and children; other aspects of relevance are countries of the majority world, 1 development and poverty, as well as culture, human rights, inclusion, equity and equality. 2 I give terms like "majority world" or "global South" general preference as they are not loaded with so-called "lag-behind" assumptions like "third world" or "developing countries", which are often discriminating and suggest that "developed countries" are where "developing countries" should develop towards (Fujiura et al. 2005). Several authors refer to this terminology within the field of disability (Barnes and Sheldon 2010;Grech 2011;Turmusani 2004). Yet, the term "developing country" has not been abandoned completely.Regarding the research as a whole, even more issues can certainly be found when looking more closely at the subject. However, from my perspective, the most relevant aspects for this book are covered. In order to provide you with a clear overview, this chapter is split into three discourses which I consider as relevant: "scientific, disciplinary and methodical", "political and developmental" and "terminological". Naturally, the three aspects are interconnected and overlap; hence, a clear delimitation between these three discourses is not possible.1 The terms used here interchangeably for so-called developing countries are "majority world" and "countries of the South". So-called developed countries are also referred to as "Western countries", "countries of the North", "minority world", etc. 2 The order in which these aspects are listed is not meant to be in line with their relevance.