Decolonising Special Education Using Ubuntu Lens

Abstract

This chapter avers that special education in the Global South has been tainted by ideological influence from the Global North. The entire architecture of special education has evolved from a Eurocentric worldview, which ignores the views and thoughts of societies that are different from the Western society. The knowledge system of special education also fails to take into account the colonial history of states that were subjected to the trauma of colonialism and which continue to manifest through coloniality and continue to exacerbate the educational disparity in these states. The gap between privileged schools and those that are marginalised continues to grow. The chapter asserts that ubuntu lens provides for a framework that can meet the needs of most developing states, which seek to experiment with a new way of thinking about special education.