About
A minor in disability studies will significantly support your academic and career aspirations. We are the first program of its kind at Rutgers University and one of only a few in the nation.
Disability Studies is a field for and by people with disabilities. Students in the minor understand disability and impairment as an essential component of the human experience, troubling outcome of power, and important feature of coalition building— a position shaped by ongoing intersections with age, race, gender, ethnicity, language, im/migration, nationality, class, and social power. Disability is an important lens for understanding and a means to create spaces and communities that serve all people equitably, not just the disabled, Deaf, neurodivergent, impaired or chronically ill. Many of our courses count toward the required General Education Curriculum. You can explore the course and career options below or contact Disabilitystudies.minor@newark.rutgers.edu.
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There are two required courses for the minor:
1. Disability Studies (21:988:306/21:300:306; 3 credits)*
In this course students learn about how to approach the study of disability from a critical perspective. We will learn to understand disability not as a deficit but as identities, communities, and as a basis for seeking justice in an ableist world. By placing disability in an intersectional perspective we will examine how disability relates to systems of racism, incarceration, settler colonialism, capitalism, gender, sex and sexuality. The class will give students an understanding of some of the core concepts in the field, including disability, ableism, normate, crip, disability justice, accessibility, amongst others. The course will highlight not only systems of oppression and exploitation but also resistance, activism and disability cultures. It will examine disability histories as well as the current cutting edge in disability studies, disability cultures, and disability movements.
2. Pick one: Inclusive and Social Justice Pedagogies (21:300:230; 3 credits)* or Educational Planning for Dually Exceptional Students (21:300:298; 3 credits)*
This course introduces students to a critical, interdisciplinary analysis of inclusive (special) education in American schooling K-16, broadly conceived. Students will review topical issues in schools including special education classification, suspension and expulsion policies, bilingual/bicultural education, restorative justice, post-secondary transition, and participatory (universal) design for learning. The course draws from legal theory, philosophy, public policy, and history to create a professional position that is justice-oriented, anti-oppressive, culturally and linguistically sustaining, race-conscious, and disability positive. Particular attention will be paid to students labeled with an educational disability who are multiply-minoritized. The course is centered around the presumption of competence and aspirational, cultural, and linguistic wealth.
The remaining credits can be completed by selecting any of the following courses for your program of study. Students must complete 18 total credits to graduate with the minor in consultation with the minor advisor.
- Decarcerating Disability and Education (21:300:305; 3 credits)*
- Educational Planning for Dually Exceptional Students (21:300:298; 3 credits)*
- Social Foundations in Urban Education (21:300:292; 3 credits)*
- History of Newark (21:512:203; 3 credits)
- Health Disparities: Implications in Urban Communities (21:300:301; 3 credits)
- Urban Sociology (21:920:321; 3 credits)
- Universal Design for Learning (Currently under review)
- Inequality (21:920:324; 3 credits)
- Human Diversity (21:910:345; 3 credits)*
- Language and Culture (21:300:491; 3 credits)
- Bilingual/Bicultural Education (21:300:490; 3 credits)
- Education and Social Change Among the Black Diaspora (21:300:358/21:014:364; 3 credits)*
- Radical Teaching: Voices of Youth Truth (21:300:190; 3 credits)
- History of African American Education (21:300:180/21:014:180; 3 credits)*
*Counts toward General Education— Other Liberal Arts
All current and interested students must meet with the program coordinator Dr. Lauren Shallish in the Urban Education Department at Rutgers Newark in order to declare the minor and progress in the program. Please note this minor does not lead to teacher certification.
Affiliated Faculty include:
- Dr. Jack Tchen, Faculty & Director of the Clement A. Price Institute on Ethnicity, Culture and the Modern Experience
- Dr. Alison Howell, Political Science
- Dr. LaChan Hannon, Urban Education
- Dr. Diane Wong, Political Science
- Dr. Takashi Amano, Social Work
- Dr. Lauren Shallish, Urban Education
People with disabilities represent the largest minoritized group in the U.S. Knowledge of disability, accessibility, and inclusion is essential for any career path or graduate programs and the advancement of a more equitable and just society.
If you are pursuing a career in medicine, social work, or human services a minor in disability studies provides critical understanding of the socio-cultural and linguistic traditions associated with disabled, neurodivergent, and D/deaf identities. This is essential for supporting the education and well-being of all children, adults, and families.
For students pursuing a career in the humanities, social sciences, journalism, and law the minor provides specialization in disability policy, law, and advocacy. You will study the sociology of disability, civil rights statues, and educational entitlement laws as they apply to students, families, and public institutions. The minor provides an understanding the environmental, social, legal, and health-related impacts on the lives of people with disabilities, their families, and community-based services with particular attention paid to the local context of Newark.
The Declaration or Change of Major/Minor Form must be completed and submitted to Dr. Lauren Shallish (Lauren.Shallish@rutgers.edu) in the Urban Education Department. A meeting must also be arranged to discuss your plan of study and related interests.
In 2021, Rutgers University-Newark hosted The Anti-Eugenics Project. Learn more about the convening and listen to keynote speakers discuss the history of eugenics; lifting up the grassroots movements working to counteract the oppressive legal and social structures that still further eugenicist ideals today.
The Society of Disability Studies is a national organization focused on the promotion of the field of disability studies and related areas of scholarship, advocacy, and reparations. Disability Studies Quarterly is the journal for the Society for Disability Studies.
