Persons with intellectual disabilities have long been excluded from being recognized as credible knowers of their own realities—an epistemic injustice rooted in a logocentric view of knowledge. Inclusive and transformative research practices that embrace embodied, emotional, and nonverbal ways of knowing hold great potential to challenge and dismantle this injustice. Moreover, such approaches can expand ways of knowing and seeing, not only for those directly involved but for society as a whole. Drawing from a phenomenological study on the lived experiences of persons with intellectual disabilities; employing phenomenological methods, this chapter explores how their perspectives and lived contexts served as transformative epistemological sites. It was found that vulnerabilities and marginalities the participants experienced were not mere deficits but generative positions for understanding leisure beyond the traditional work-leisure dichotomy. Moreover, by embracing the embedded nature of leisure experience, the study illuminates the relational and contextual dimensions of leisure. Thereby, demonstrating how an epistemically just research methodology enriches the understanding of the themes in focus, this chapter calls for social work research to embrace methodologies that are organic, participative, contextual, and critical.

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When Marginality Becomes a Site of Insight: Methodological Lessons from a Study on Leisure Among Persons with Intellectual Disabilities in Kerala

  • Febna Reheem,
  • Srilatha Juvva,
  • Lekshmi V. Nair

摘要

Persons with intellectual disabilities have long been excluded from being recognized as credible knowers of their own realities—an epistemic injustice rooted in a logocentric view of knowledge. Inclusive and transformative research practices that embrace embodied, emotional, and nonverbal ways of knowing hold great potential to challenge and dismantle this injustice. Moreover, such approaches can expand ways of knowing and seeing, not only for those directly involved but for society as a whole. Drawing from a phenomenological study on the lived experiences of persons with intellectual disabilities; employing phenomenological methods, this chapter explores how their perspectives and lived contexts served as transformative epistemological sites. It was found that vulnerabilities and marginalities the participants experienced were not mere deficits but generative positions for understanding leisure beyond the traditional work-leisure dichotomy. Moreover, by embracing the embedded nature of leisure experience, the study illuminates the relational and contextual dimensions of leisure. Thereby, demonstrating how an epistemically just research methodology enriches the understanding of the themes in focus, this chapter calls for social work research to embrace methodologies that are organic, participative, contextual, and critical.