Reexamining the Promise of Parent Participation in Special Education: An Analysis of Cultural and Social Capital

Highly regulated parent participation in special education requires both parents and teachers to use cultural and social capital relative to education legislation, disability, and parenting. Examined through a Bourdieuian analytical lens, data from focus groups and individual interviews with families provide examples of the salience of disability in the acquisition and use of cultural and social capital in educational contexts, serving to both reify dominance and support individual agency. [special education, Bourdieu, cultural capital, disability].