Skip to content

Booksellers & Trade Customers: Sign up for online bulk buying at trade.atlanticbooks.com for wholesale discounts

Booksellers: Create Account on our B2B Portal for wholesale discounts

The Unteachables: Disability Rights and the Invention of Black Special Education

by Keith A. Mayes
Save 17% Save 17%
Current price ₹3,495.00
Original price ₹4,194.00
Original price ₹4,194.00
Original price ₹4,194.00
(-17%)
₹3,495.00
Current price ₹3,495.00

Imported Edition - Ships in 18-21 Days

Free Shipping in India on orders above Rs. 500

Request Bulk Quantity Quote
+91
Book cover type: Paperback
  • ISBN13: 9781517910273
  • Binding: Paperback
  • Subject: N/A
  • Publisher: University of Minnesota Press
  • Publisher Imprint: University of Minnesota Press
  • Publication Date:
  • Pages: 384
  • Original Price: USD 30.0
  • Language: English
  • Edition: N/A
  • Item Weight: 454 grams
  • BISAC Subject(s): Special Education / General, Discrimination, and Philosophy, Theory & Social Aspects

How special education used disability labels to marginalize Black students in public schools

The Unteachables examines the overrepresentation of Black students in special education over the course of the twentieth century. As African American children integrated predominantly white schools, many were disproportionately labeled educable mentally retarded (EMR), learning disabled (LD), and emotionally behavioral disordered (EBD). Keith A. Mayes charts the evolution of disability categories and how these labels kept Black learners segregated in American classrooms.

The civil rights and the educational disability rights movements, Mayes shows, have both collaborated and worked at cross-purposes since the beginning of school desegregation. Disability rights advocates built upon the opportunity provided by the civil rights movement to make claims about student invisibility at the level of intellectual and cognitive disabilities. Although special education ostensibly included children from all racial groups, educational disability rights advocates focused on the needs of white disabled students, while school systems used disability discourses to malign and marginalize Black students.

From the 1940s to the present, social science researchers, policymakers, school administrators, and teachers have each contributed to the overrepresentation of Black students in special education. Excavating the deep-seated racism embedded in both the public school system and public policy, The Unteachables explores the discriminatory labeling of Black students, and how it indelibly contributed to special education disproportionality, to student discipline and push-out practices, and to the school-to-prison pipeline effect.

Keith A. Mayes is associate professor in African American & African Studies and faculty affiliate in Sociocultural Studies in Education at the University of Minnesota. He is author of Kwanzaa: Black Power and the Making of the African American Holiday Tradition.

Trusted for over 49 years

Family Owned Company

Secure Payment

All Major Credit Cards/Debit Cards/UPI & More Accepted

New & Authentic Products

India's Largest Distributor

Need Support?

Whatsapp Us