Julie Allan
Biographic Data
| ID | 3587597 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Julie Allan |
| GIVEN NAMES | Julie |
| FAMILY NAME | Allan |
| SIGNATURE | ALLAN J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Birmingham |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-3104-0139 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 46 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 202 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 44 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1992 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Mending the (broken) Send system in England and repaying debts to children, families and professionals
This article examines the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) system in England, and the ‘crisis’ it is reported to be in. It is argued that three principal factors lie at the heart of the crisis: a failure to be inclusive, out of control spending on SEND and the lack of confidence of children and families in the system. It reports the significant consequences of the damage inflicted upon young people and their families but reframes t…
Including all: The contribution of a diverse research community
This article explores the tensions within inclusive education and emphasizes the research community’s responsibility to enhance the understanding and practical application of inclusive practices. It highlights the challenges the researchers face when navigating diverse scientific disciplines, often leading to entrenched policies that overlook varied epistemologies. We aim to display and open for scrutiny current and ongoing social epistemologies …
Learning from and with refugee teachers: Exploring subjective journeys and the making of equitable communities in Malaysia
This paper explores the personal and professional journeys of refugee teachers participating in the ‘Teachers for Education Equity’ PGCEi programme in Malaysia, designed by the [University's name anonymised]. Drawing on qualitative research, it examines how refugee teachers navigate teaching roles in marginalised educational contexts, and how their experiences shape equitable and inclusive communities. Using post-structural theory, particularly D…
Rethinking inclusive (digital) education: Lessons from the pandemic to reconceptualise inclusion through convivial technologies
The COVID-19 pandemic and the move to remote education exposed old and new inequities, yet it also represented an opportunity to rethink inclusive education. This paper presents findings from a one-year project DIGITAL in a time of Coronavirus and draws upon policy analysis and interviews with teachers, principals, and community leaders from six countries in the Global North and South (Italy, England, Malaysia, Australia, United States and Chile)…
Approaching the self: Alternative perspectives of selfwork in education
In this paper we respond to this special issue’s critical focus on mental health in education by considering the medicalised and homogenising approaches to the mental health of young people and the severely negative consequences for young people. Our argument is underpinned by the need to destabilise the hegemony of the current dominant discourses and practices of mental health used in education. The problem with these discourses and practices, i…
Other sociologies of education: Providing critical perspectives from the Global South and North
Inclusion: How Far Have We Come and How Far Can We Go
The question of whether inclusion has gone too far is being raised by a growing number of people. In Sweden, this has been formalised in a governmental declaration that also recommends that children with special needs should have access to specialist segregated provision. In this paper, the question of how far we have come towards inclusive education is considered and the barriers to progress, that come from the system, attitudes and outcomes, ar…
Our school: Our space – inclusion and young people’s experiences of space within an English secondary free school
This paper reports on the findings from a study based in England, within a new school that opened its doors to students in August 2015. The school, established under relatively recent UK legislation as a ‘Free School’, set out to be inclusive, aiming to achieve this through its architecture and design, admissions policy, mixed attainment class organisation and inclusive teaching practices. The research project tracked the school’s growth and exam…
Disability and inclusion in Kazakhstan
The Republic of Kazakhstan ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled People in January 2015 as part of a programme of ‘Future without Barriers’ and has sought to make the majority of its schools inclusive. This paper reports on progress towards inclusion and the challenges faced by a nation that is aspiring to develop as an independent nation whilst still utilising knowledge and capital from the former Soviet Union. An anal…
Inclusion, social capital and space within an English secondary free school
This article discusses interactions and inclusion at a newly built and recently opened secondary free school in England, presenting findings from a qualitative research project carried out in 2016–2018. Free schools were introduced in England in 2010 and enable parents, community organisations, charities and universities to set up their own schools, funded by the government, but entitled to decide on their own curriculum, staffing and admissions …
Education, schooling and inclusive practice at a secondary free school in England
This paper reports the experiences of staff, parents, governors and students at a secondary free school in the West Midlands of England in relation to the inclusion of students with special educational needs (SEN). The paper is based on a qualitative research project carried out at a school that opened in 2015, with the explicit aim of examining the extent to which it developed as an inclusive school, particularly for children with SEN. In the pa…
Here I come again’: The cost of success for higher education students diagnosed with autism
This qualitative study used Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis to consult with 16 autistic UK higher education (HE) students about their experiences of success. An in-depth participatory approach encouraged participants to become co-analysts of their data.Participants offered counter-narratives to deficit-based interpretations of autism, giving accounts of making themselves ‘extra-visible’ as autistic in order to assert their rights. The au…
Ghostings, materialisations and flows in Britain's special educational needs and disability assemblage
In this paper we argue that the UK government's new special educational needs and disability (SEND) Code of Practice marks a further movement in the expansion of what Tomlinson has identified as the SEN industry. Yet at the same time, we suggest that the Code inaugurates a series of less familiar movements of policy, of governance and responsibility, of understanding SEND, and of the constitution of subjects identified in these terms. We make use…
Guest editorial: Special education and the deviant child in the Nordic countries - the impact of Foucault
The rhetoric of inclusion
With the publication of this selection of key texts, Sally Tomlinson joins Routledge’s World Library of Educationalists, a hall of fame already occupied by the likes of Jerome S. Bruner, Michael Ap
Making a difference – in theory – in Sweden and the UK
This article considers the place of theory within education in two contexts – Sweden and the UK – and advances the argument that both governments and academics themselves have contributed to a ‘theoryless’ education. Examples are offered from the fate of education science in Sweden and, in the UK, from responses to the Research Excellence Framework (REF) and from the actions of a group of independent academics charged with producing guidelines fo…
Medicus interruptus in the behaviour of children in disadvantaged contexts in Scotland
The medicalisation of the behaviour of children is a phenomenon that is attracting growing attention, with particular concern about the increased likelihood of children living in disadvantaged contexts receiving a medical diagnosis, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and treatment. This paper reports on a study of professionals involved with children experiencing behavioural problems. The professionals interviewed in this study art…
Including ideology
Ellen Brantlinger's paper, Using ideology: cases of non-recognition of the politics of research and practice in special education (Brantlinger, E. 1997. Using ideology: Cases of nonrecognition of the politics of research and practice in special education. Review of Educational Research 67, no. 4: 425–59), was of considerable significance in drawing attention to the central role of ideology in research in special and inclusive education. Her power…
Social Capital, Children and Young People: Implications for practice, policy and research
Social capital, children and young people is about the relationships and networks - social capital - that children and young people have in and out of school. Social capital has become of increasin ...
Social Capital, Children and Young People: Implications for Practice, Policy and Research
Social capital, children and young people is about the relationships and networks - social capital - that children and young people have in and out of school.Social capital has become of increasing interest to policy makers but there has been little evidence of how it operates in practice. In this unique collection, the social capital of children and young people, and in one case parents and teachers, is explored in a wide range of formal and inf…
The education question in theory and the theory question in education—Introduction to the Special Issue
The Theory Question in Research Capacity Building in Education: Towards an Agenda for Research and Practice
The question of capacity building in education has predominantly been approached with regard to the methods and methodologies of educational research. Far less attention has been given to capacity building in relation to theory. In many ways the latter is as pressing an issue as the former, given that good research depends on a combination of high quality techniques and high quality theorising. The ability to capitalise on capacity building in re…
Inclusion and exclusion in the university
Knowledge exchange with Sistema Scotland
This paper reports on a knowledge exchange project, funded by the Scottish Funding Council and undertaken by a group of researchers from three higher education institutions in Scotland and the project partner, Sistema Scotland. This newly established charity is attempting to implement a major programme of social change, developed in Venezuela, within the Raploch, a disadvantaged area of Scotland. The researchers’ combined knowledge of education, …
The sociology of disability and the struggle for inclusive education
This article charts the emergence of the sociology of disability and examines the areas of contestation. These have involved a series of erasures and absences – the removal of the body from debates on the social model of disability; the disappearance of the Other from educational policies and practices; and the absence of academics from political discourses and action. The paper considers the contribution of the sociology of disability to inclusi…
Excluding the included: A reconsideration of inclusive education
This article examines how the development of inclusive education policies has been constrained by the adhesion of traditional regular and special education imperatives. The fragmentation of educational policy-making presses us towards exclusion; and the protection of professional interests reinforces individual pathologies and creates further exclusionary pressures. The authors contend that inclusive education is not a linear progression from 'sp…
Foucault and Special Educational Needs: A 'box of tools' for analysing children's experiences of mainstreaming
Research on children with special educational needs in mainstream schools, based on simplistic notions of integration, has revealed very little about the nature of their school experiences. A Foucauldian perspective is proposed as an alternative, and the relevance of his methodology, which focuses on formal and informal discourses, and his analyses (particularly of medicine, madness and discipline) is discussed. It is argued that Foucaldt offers …
Deterritorializations: Putting postmodernism to work on teacher education and inclusion
(2004). Deterritorializations: Putting postmodernism to work on teacher education and inclusion. Educational Philosophy and Theory: Vol. 36, No. 4, pp. 417-432
The sociology of disability and the struggle for inclusive education
This article charts the emergence of the sociology of disability and examines the areas of contestation. These have involved a series of erasures and absences – the removal of the body from debates on the social model of disability; the disappearance of the Other from educational policies and practices; and the absence of academics from political discourses and action. The paper considers the contribution of the sociology of disability to inclusi…
Ghostings, materialisations and flows in Britain's special educational needs and disability assemblage
In this paper we argue that the UK government's new special educational needs and disability (SEND) Code of Practice marks a further movement in the expansion of what Tomlinson has identified as the SEN industry. Yet at the same time, we suggest that the Code inaugurates a series of less familiar movements of policy, of governance and responsibility, of understanding SEND, and of the constitution of subjects identified in these terms. We make use…
The repetition of exclusion
Special educational needs will be a thing of the past (Her Majesty's Inspector of Education Mike Gibson, Addressing the National Association of Special Educational Needs Conference, 2004) The strain imposed by social inclusion in some of our schools is in danger of becoming a time bomb waiting to explode unless properly resourced ... we all want inclusion for all young people in Scotland, including asylum seeker children, so that they to can look…
Can the Mothers of Invention Make Virtue out of Necessity? An optimistic deconstruction of research compromises in contract research and evaluation
This article offers a retrospective deconstruction of research compromises undertaken during ‘quick and dirty’ contract evaluation. The deconstruction identifies constraining changes in the nature of research contexts, but develops a positive view of methodological developments which might be regarded as creating ‘transgressive validity’. Notions of ‘hybridity’ in research methodology, and of ‘negotiation’ in research procedures are considered
Social Capital, Social Inclusion and Changing School Contexts: A Scottish Perspective
This paper synthesises a collaborative review of social capital theory, with particular regard for its relevance to the changing educational landscape within Scotland. The review considers the common and distinctive elements of social capital, developed by the founding fathers--Putnam, Bourdieu and Coleman--and explores how these might help to understand the changing contexts and pursue opportunities for growth
Educational renewal as democratic practice: New' community schooling in Scotland
This paper focuses on the New Community Schools (NCS) initiative as currently being developed in Scotland. This major 5-year programme is one of a raft of educational initiatives that the Scottish Executive is supporting across local authorities. Drawing on documentary evidence and interview data, we discuss the potential of this programme for professional renewal across a range of occupational groups involved in NCS: community, health and social…
Joking with Disability: What's the Difference between the Comic and the Tragic in Disability Discourses
This article discusses the discourses of disability through a parallel `disabling' of its own text. It draws on literary as well as sociological sources in order to interrogate the nature and relations of the `tragic', the `heroic' and the `comic'. The authors offer the conclusion that the comic is never quite absent from the discourse of tragedy (after Kundera), and turn that insight back on their own text, in an attempt to refuse the solemnitie…
Disability and inclusion in Kazakhstan
The Republic of Kazakhstan ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled People in January 2015 as part of a programme of ‘Future without Barriers’ and has sought to make the majority of its schools inclusive. This paper reports on progress towards inclusion and the challenges faced by a nation that is aspiring to develop as an independent nation whilst still utilising knowledge and capital from the former Soviet Union. An anal…
Here I come again’: The cost of success for higher education students diagnosed with autism
This qualitative study used Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis to consult with 16 autistic UK higher education (HE) students about their experiences of success. An in-depth participatory approach encouraged participants to become co-analysts of their data.Participants offered counter-narratives to deficit-based interpretations of autism, giving accounts of making themselves ‘extra-visible’ as autistic in order to assert their rights. The au…
The Theory Question in Research Capacity Building in Education: Towards an Agenda for Research and Practice
The question of capacity building in education has predominantly been approached with regard to the methods and methodologies of educational research. Far less attention has been given to capacity building in relation to theory. In many ways the latter is as pressing an issue as the former, given that good research depends on a combination of high quality techniques and high quality theorising. The ability to capitalise on capacity building in re…
If you can: Inclusion in music making
This paper steps outside of conventional frameworks of schooling and examines inclusion from the perspective of eight young people and adults who play Scottish fiddle music in a group. The participants were asked to talk about their experiences of playing and their involvement with the group in practice and performance sessions. The group had been portrayed by its members as both inclusive, in the sense of involving players with a range of abilit…
Children's rights in school: Power, assemblies and assemblages
Daring to think otherwise? Educational policymaking in the Scottish Parliament
This paper examines the process of policy-making within the Scottish Parliament, focusing in particular on the activities of the All Party Committee of Sport, Education, and Culture. I report on the Inquiry process from an insider/outsider position as advisor to the Committee in its Inquiry into special educational needs provision in Scotland and explore the contrasts between the 'Inquiry' and more conventional forms of policymaking. It is argued…
Inclusion: How Far Have We Come and How Far Can We Go
The question of whether inclusion has gone too far is being raised by a growing number of people. In Sweden, this has been formalised in a governmental declaration that also recommends that children with special needs should have access to specialist segregated provision. In this paper, the question of how far we have come towards inclusive education is considered and the barriers to progress, that come from the system, attitudes and outcomes, ar…
Our school: Our space – inclusion and young people’s experiences of space within an English secondary free school
This paper reports on the findings from a study based in England, within a new school that opened its doors to students in August 2015. The school, established under relatively recent UK legislation as a ‘Free School’, set out to be inclusive, aiming to achieve this through its architecture and design, admissions policy, mixed attainment class organisation and inclusive teaching practices. The research project tracked the school’s growth and exam…
Inclusion, social capital and space within an English secondary free school
This article discusses interactions and inclusion at a newly built and recently opened secondary free school in England, presenting findings from a qualitative research project carried out in 2016–2018. Free schools were introduced in England in 2010 and enable parents, community organisations, charities and universities to set up their own schools, funded by the government, but entitled to decide on their own curriculum, staffing and admissions …
Including ideology
Ellen Brantlinger's paper, Using ideology: cases of non-recognition of the politics of research and practice in special education (Brantlinger, E. 1997. Using ideology: Cases of nonrecognition of the politics of research and practice in special education. Review of Educational Research 67, no. 4: 425–59), was of considerable significance in drawing attention to the central role of ideology in research in special and inclusive education. Her power…
Guest editorial: Special education and the deviant child in the Nordic countries - the impact of Foucault
Making a difference – in theory – in Sweden and the UK
This article considers the place of theory within education in two contexts – Sweden and the UK – and advances the argument that both governments and academics themselves have contributed to a ‘theoryless’ education. Examples are offered from the fate of education science in Sweden and, in the UK, from responses to the Research Excellence Framework (REF) and from the actions of a group of independent academics charged with producing guidelines fo…
Medicus interruptus in the behaviour of children in disadvantaged contexts in Scotland
The medicalisation of the behaviour of children is a phenomenon that is attracting growing attention, with particular concern about the increased likelihood of children living in disadvantaged contexts receiving a medical diagnosis, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, and treatment. This paper reports on a study of professionals involved with children experiencing behavioural problems. The professionals interviewed in this study art…
Knowledge exchange with Sistema Scotland
This paper reports on a knowledge exchange project, funded by the Scottish Funding Council and undertaken by a group of researchers from three higher education institutions in Scotland and the project partner, Sistema Scotland. This newly established charity is attempting to implement a major programme of social change, developed in Venezuela, within the Raploch, a disadvantaged area of Scotland. The researchers’ combined knowledge of education, …
Making a Difference: NGOs and Development in a Changing World
Foreword * Contributors * Part I: Introduction * Part II: Working with Government * Part III: Increasing Impact Through Organisational Growth * Part IV: Linking the Grassroots with Lobbying and Advocacy * Advocacy in the North * Conclusion * References * Index
Foucault and Special Educational Needs: A 'box of tools' for analysing children's experiences of mainstreaming
Research on children with special educational needs in mainstream schools, based on simplistic notions of integration, has revealed very little about the nature of their school experiences. A Foucauldian perspective is proposed as an alternative, and the relevance of his methodology, which focuses on formal and informal discourses, and his analyses (particularly of medicine, madness and discipline) is discussed. It is argued that Foucaldt offers …
Can the Mothers of Invention Make Virtue out of Necessity? An optimistic deconstruction of research compromises in contract research and evaluation
This article offers a retrospective deconstruction of research compromises undertaken during ‘quick and dirty’ contract evaluation. The deconstruction identifies constraining changes in the nature of research contexts, but develops a positive view of methodological developments which might be regarded as creating ‘transgressive validity’. Notions of ‘hybridity’ in research methodology, and of ‘negotiation’ in research procedures are considered
With a little help from my friends? Integration and the role of mainstream pupils
With a little help from my friends? Integration and the role of mainstream pupils
With a little help from my friends? Integration and the role of mainstream pupils
This paper examines the role of mainstream pupils in the integration of pupils with special educational needs (SEN), based on their accounts of this process. It is argued that mainstream pupils control the experiences of pupils with SEN in both positive and negative ways and that schools need to become more aware of this if integration is to be successful. The paper ends with some suggestions as to how schools might guide mainstream pupils' under…
Joking with Disability: What's the Difference between the Comic and the Tragic in Disability Discourses
This article discusses the discourses of disability through a parallel `disabling' of its own text. It draws on literary as well as sociological sources in order to interrogate the nature and relations of the `tragic', the `heroic' and the `comic'. The authors offer the conclusion that the comic is never quite absent from the discourse of tragedy (after Kundera), and turn that insight back on their own text, in an attempt to refuse the solemnitie…
Educational renewal as democratic practice: New' community schooling in Scotland
This paper focuses on the New Community Schools (NCS) initiative as currently being developed in Scotland. This major 5-year programme is one of a raft of educational initiatives that the Scottish Executive is supporting across local authorities. Drawing on documentary evidence and interview data, we discuss the potential of this programme for professional renewal across a range of occupational groups involved in NCS: community, health and social…
Educational renewal as democratic practice: New' community schooling in Scotland
This paper focuses on the New Community Schools (NCS) initiative as currently being developed in Scotland. This major 5-year programme is one of a raft of educational initiatives that the Scottish Executive is supporting across local authorities. Drawing on documentary evidence and interview data, we discuss the potential of this programme for professional renewal across a range of occupational groups involved in NCS: community, health and social…
Excluding the included: A reconsideration of inclusive education
This article examines how the development of inclusive education policies has been constrained by the adhesion of traditional regular and special education imperatives. The fragmentation of educational policy-making presses us towards exclusion; and the protection of professional interests reinforces individual pathologies and creates further exclusionary pressures. The authors contend that inclusive education is not a linear progression from 'sp…
Inclusion, Participation and Democracy: What is the Purpose?
The question of inclusive education is one which many societies are attempting to address. It is a fundamentally serious and complex issue raising challenges that cover conceptual, organizational, ped
Daring to think otherwise? Educational policymaking in the Scottish Parliament
This paper examines the process of policy-making within the Scottish Parliament, focusing in particular on the activities of the All Party Committee of Sport, Education, and Culture. I report on the Inquiry process from an insider/outsider position as advisor to the Committee in its Inquiry into special educational needs provision in Scotland and explore the contrasts between the 'Inquiry' and more conventional forms of policymaking. It is argued…
If you can: Inclusion in music making
This paper steps outside of conventional frameworks of schooling and examines inclusion from the perspective of eight young people and adults who play Scottish fiddle music in a group. The participants were asked to talk about their experiences of playing and their involvement with the group in practice and performance sessions. The group had been portrayed by its members as both inclusive, in the sense of involving players with a range of abilit…
Children's rights in school: Power, assemblies and assemblages
Deterritorializations: Putting postmodernism to work on teacher education and inclusion
(2004). Deterritorializations: Putting postmodernism to work on teacher education and inclusion. Educational Philosophy and Theory: Vol. 36, No. 4, pp. 417-432
Children’s rights in practice: A study of change within a primary school
How might a concern with children’s spirituality ‘touch down’ within the different spaces, discourses and performances within a school? This article is concerned with the affordances of children’s rights discourse in relation to young people’s participation, deliberation, and ethical work upon the self, within one primary school in Scotland. We report on the findings of a three‐year research project involving researchers at the University of Stir…
New Community Schools and the measurement of transformation
The New Community Schools initiative was introduced in Scotland in 1998 with the aims of improving participation, raising achievement, improving health and transforming communities. The success of the initiative was evaluated in terms of the stated aims. In relation to improving participation and raising achievement, this was straightforward: improved participation was measured by the number of community activities and the number of individuals w…
The repetition of exclusion
Special educational needs will be a thing of the past (Her Majesty's Inspector of Education Mike Gibson, Addressing the National Association of Special Educational Needs Conference, 2004) The strain imposed by social inclusion in some of our schools is in danger of becoming a time bomb waiting to explode unless properly resourced ... we all want inclusion for all young people in Scotland, including asylum seeker children, so that they to can look…
Social Capital, Social Inclusion and Changing School Contexts: A Scottish Perspective
This paper synthesises a collaborative review of social capital theory, with particular regard for its relevance to the changing educational landscape within Scotland. The review considers the common and distinctive elements of social capital, developed by the founding fathers--Putnam, Bourdieu and Coleman--and explores how these might help to understand the changing contexts and pursue opportunities for growth
Social Capital, Professionalism and Diversity
Social Capital, Professionalism and Diversity is a response to the challenges faced by teachers and other public sector professionals in attempting to manage an increasingly diverse population, whilst simultaneously being subjected to public scrutiny through measures of performance. Social capital has increasingly been seen by policy makers and academics as a possible resource for education, allowing children and young people, and the professiona…
Inclusion and exclusion in the university
Knowledge exchange with Sistema Scotland
This paper reports on a knowledge exchange project, funded by the Scottish Funding Council and undertaken by a group of researchers from three higher education institutions in Scotland and the project partner, Sistema Scotland. This newly established charity is attempting to implement a major programme of social change, developed in Venezuela, within the Raploch, a disadvantaged area of Scotland. The researchers’ combined knowledge of education, …
The sociology of disability and the struggle for inclusive education
This article charts the emergence of the sociology of disability and examines the areas of contestation. These have involved a series of erasures and absences – the removal of the body from debates on the social model of disability; the disappearance of the Other from educational policies and practices; and the absence of academics from political discourses and action. The paper considers the contribution of the sociology of disability to inclusi…
The inclusive teacher educator: Spaces for Civic Engagement
This paper is concerned with the teacher educator who is aspiring to be inclusive. It considers the obligations which arise within Higher Education Institutions and the extent to which these contribute to a loss of civic engagement and a lack of capacity to pursue inclusion, social justice and equity. The paper argues that this need not be the case and a reorientation for teacher educators is offered which affords teacher educators opportunities …
The Theory Question in Research Capacity Building in Education: Towards an Agenda for Research and Practice
The question of capacity building in education has predominantly been approached with regard to the methods and methodologies of educational research. Far less attention has been given to capacity building in relation to theory. In many ways the latter is as pressing an issue as the former, given that good research depends on a combination of high quality techniques and high quality theorising. The ability to capitalise on capacity building in re…
Sociology (39 works) · Political science (34 works) · Pedagogy (24 works) · Social science (19 works) · Law (17 works) · Psychology (16 works) · Inclusion (mineral (13 works) · Global Educational Policies and Reforms (12 works) · Politics (12 works) · Public relations (12 works)