Constructing Smartness and Intelligence: A Content Analysis of Postsecondary Disability Literature

Abstract

Expectations of smartness are woven into the foundation of postsecondary education (e.g. admissions, grading). This content analysis examines current postsecondary dis/ability literature through the theoretical frame of DisCrit to identify how concepts of smartness are treated within the field. The findings call for greater interrogation of the ways smartness operates as a parallel ideology to whiteness, and how together they influence how students experience and are known in postsecondary education.

Keywords:

• Classroom
• disability
• DisCrit
• smartness
• race