Call for Papers: ALR Special Issue on Cultural Life, Disability, Inclusion and Citizenship

We reside within a global village, approximately 10 per cent of the world's population or 650 million people(including about 200 million children) are living with some form of disability(United Nations, 2009).  The World Health Organization and the United Nations have recognized that people with disability have a right to access services from all areas of citizenship (Darcy & Taylor, 2009; Genoe & Singleton, 2009). 

In particular, the United Nations' Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (United Nations, 2006), Article 30 recognises 'cultural life' as an important part of any person's citizenship. As the United Nations' outline, whether 'cultural life' is recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism it is the enriching part of people's lives where they strive to express themselves away from the everyday reality of their lifestyle situation and other constraints (Barnes, Mercer, & Shakespeare, 1999). 

As Stebbins (2006) and others have argued, for some individuals and groups of people with disability, 'cultural life' (recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism ) plays a far more important role as they have been denied active citizenship in employment. Cultural life (recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism )has become the 'serious' focus of their existence (Patterson & Lobo, 2000;Shaw & Dawson, 2001; Stebbins, 2000). Yet, a great deal of research has focused on the medicalised benefits of sport and active recreation for people with disability due to lower levels of participation than the general population (e.g. Cooper et al., 1999; Darcy, Taylor, Murphy, & Lock, 2011). While a very important consideration, participation in 'cultural life' is more than sport and active recreation for prescribed therapeutic outcomes (Darcy, et al., 2011).

The purpose of this call for papers for the Special issue is to seek contributions examining the inclusion and citizenship of people with disability in' cultural life' (recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism): 

a)      clarify what the terms inclusion and citizenship mean in different cultures;

b)      to place inclusion and citizenship to 'cultural life '(recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism) across discourses relating to economic, social and environmental contexts that affect people with disabilities participation; and

c)       to discuss the terms inclusion and citizenship from the ideological frameworks of government, researchers, providers of service or disability advocacy groups.

Submissions are sought from the consumer (demand), providers (supply) and coordination/regulation (government) sector perspectives. The guest editor invites interested researchers to contribute theoretical, methodological or empirical papers related to the theme of this Special issue. The topics of potential papers include but are not limited to:

• The role of inclusion and citizenship in the construction of 'cultural life'(recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism) environments and experiences;
• What is the impact of inclusion/exclusion on the person and their experiences?;
• The social and/or cultural construction of inclusion in 'cultural life'(recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism) activities and experiences;
• The role of inclusion in the construction of cultural, sub cultural and personal identities of different societies;
• The role of inclusion in the construction and/or deconstruction of the intersection with gendered, ethnic and sexual identities within the experience of 'cultural life'(recreation, leisure, the arts, sport or tourism);
• How experiences of inclusion compare and contrast between different dimensions of disability (e.g. mobility, vision, hearing, cognitive, sensitivities etc.);
• The impact of inclusion and citizenship within space and place making

Submission Guidelines

1. In the first instance authors are invited to submit a 500 word abstract listen to meet with indicative of references for consideration for the special issue.
2. Electronic submission of the abstract should be sent by e-mail attachment to Jerome@dal.ca
3. Authors will then be selected to complete a full paper based on their abstract for potential publication subject to the full double-blind review process as required by Annals of Leisure Research.
4. Abstracts and papers should be sent as Microsoft Word file attachments using APA sixth edition.
5. Articles will be 5000-6000 words in length including references using APA sixth edition.
6. All submissions will be anonymously reviewed by two independent assessors.

Important Dates:

Abstract deadline: 30 June 2011 to jerome@dal.ca

Notification of acceptance of abstracts deadline: 1 August 2011

Submission for double-blind reviewing process: 30 November2011

Review Process Notification: 30 January  2012

Special issue publication: June or December 2012

Co-editors