Balancing attendance and disclosure: identity work of students with invisible disabilities

• Published in: Disability & society Vol. 39; no. 8; pp. 2032 - 2052
• Main Authors: Sapir, Adi, Banai, Adi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Abingdon Routledge 13.09.2024; Taylor & Francis Ltd
• Subjects: Belonging; chronic illness; disclosure; Higher education; Identity; Individualism; invisible disability; People with disabilities; Performativity; Physical education; Sociocultural factors; Students; Students with disabilities
• ISSN: 0968-7599; 1360-0508
• DOI: 10.1080/09687599.2023.2181765

Despite increasing societal awareness of the challenges faced by students with disabilities, students with invisible disabilities have received relatively little attention. This study explores these students' experiences, relying on interviews with 15 participants with various invisible disabilities who recently attended Israeli higher education institutions. Drawing on the analytical perspective of identity work, we explore how participants negotiate and construct their identities as students in the physical and sociocultural environments of higher education. We show that participants largely practice identity work over two continua: between presence and absence in academic spaces; and between revealing and concealing their disabilities in the context of an institutional climate underpinned by values of individualism, competition, and performativity. Through this spatial and discursive identity work, students construct their identities as abled and capable students and foster their sense of belonging in a prevailing ableist academic culture. This study explored the strategies that students with invisible disabilities develop to negotiate higher education environments and craft their student identity. Students with invisible disabilities actively shape and develop their identities in response to academic space and academic culture by positioning themselves along two continua: between presence and absences in various academic spaces; and between disclosing and concealing their disabilities. Students with invisible disabilities negotiate presence versus absence in physical spaces-in the context of physical barriers such as low temperatures, long distances, and closed spaces coupled with strict timetables and attendance requirements. Students with invisible disabilities negotiate disclosure versus concealment of disabilities-in the context of institutional expectations and requirements constructed around the image of 'normal,' that is, able-bodied, students.