Patty Douglas

(she/her)

1

Article

0

Comments
  • Associate Professor of Disability Studies in Education and Inaugural Chair in Student Success and Wellness, Queen's University, Ontario

Patty Douglas is an Associate Professor, the Inaugural Chair in Student Success and Wellness and Director of the Centre for Community Engagement and Social Change in Education at Queen’s University. Her research in critical and social justice approaches to autism, neurodiversity, education and care is deeply community-engaged, informed by critical disability studies, critical arts-based, participatory, decolonial, intersectional and other critical approaches. Patty enjoys mentoring students and is a leader in her fields, founding and directing the multimedia storytelling project Re•Storying Autism in Education in Canada, the UK and Aotearoa over the past 8 years. Patty has published widely and is a highly sought public speaker, collaborator and leader in her fields. Her monograph, Unmothering Autism: Ethical Disruptions and Affirming Care is available from UBC Press. For more information, see restoryingautism.com.

Experience

  • 2016–present
    Associate professor, Brandon University
  • 2023–present
    Chair in Student Success and Wellness, Queen's University
  • 2024–present
    Director, Centre for Community Engagement and Social Change, Queen's University
  • 2023–present
    Associate Professor, Queen's University

Education

  • 2016 
    University of Toronto, PhD
  • 2010 
    University of Toronto, MA
  • 2009 
    York University , BA
  • 2002 
    University of Toronto, BEd

Publications

  • 2026
    Beyond ‘Inclusionism’: Unmaking and Remaking Autism and Inclusion through Creative Research. In Carla Rice, Nadine Changfoot and Eliza Chandler (eds.). Practicing the Social. , Wilfred Laurier Press
  • 2025
    A rapid scoping review of the mental health needs and mental health support of carers of adults with learning disabilities in the United Kingdom, International Journal of Disability and Social Justice
  • 2025
    Storytelling methods on the move. Special Issue, Critical Autism Studies: Methodological Incursions , International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education
  • 2024
    Dis/entangling the cultural politics of care, Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research, 26(1), 28-43
  • 2024
    Beyond disordered brains and mother blame: Critical issues in autism and mothering. In B. Lewis, A. Ali, and J. Russell (Eds.). Mad Studies Reader: Interdisciplinary Innovations in Mental Health. , Routledge
  • 2024
    When father Christmas is the gaslighter: How special education systems make (m)others mad, Journal of Literary and Cultural Disability Studies, 18 (1)
  • 2024
    Unmothering Autism: Ethical Disruptions and Affirming Care, UBC Press
  • 2024
    The commodification of care: Precarious custodial relationships, disability, and settler-colonialism. In G. Ciciurkaite & R.L. Brown, (Eds.) Disability and the Changing Contexts of Family and Personal Relationships, 61-79 (Research in Rural Sociology and Development, Vol. 15), Emerald
  • 2023
    Developing the right(s) approach for autism. In A. Beckett and A. Callus (Eds.). Routledge Handbook on Children's Rights & Disability (pp. 113-128) , Routledge
  • 2023
    Re-imagining Inclusion Through the Lens of Disabled Childhoods, Social Inclusion, 11(1), 1-12
  • 2023
    Weighing in: Academic writers on neurodiversity, The International Journal of Disability and Social Justice, 3(3), 72-98
  • 2022
    Stretching Our Stories (SOS): Digital Worldmaking in Troubled Times, Public: Art, Culture, Ideas, 33(66), 154-177
  • 2022
    Autistic, surviving and thriving under COVID-19: Imagining Inclusive autistic futures, Lateral: Journal of the Cultural Studies Association, 11(2)
  • 2022
    Contemplating teacher talk through a critical autism studies lens. In D. Milton & S. Ryan (Eds.). The Routledge International Handbook of Critical Autism Studies (pp. 242-254). , Routledge
  • 2022
    Making memories, making madness: Mad (m)others of disabled children write back through digital storytelling, Journal on Developmental Disabilities, 27(2), 1-19
  • 2021
    Mad mothering: Learning from the intersections of madness, mothering and disability, Journal of Literary and Cultural Disability Studies, 15(1), 39-56
  • 2021
    Pandemic Effects: Ableism, Exclusion and Procedural Bias, Journal of Childhood Studies, 46(3), 16-29
  • 2021
    Re-storying autism: A body becoming disability studies in education approach, International Journal of Inclusive Education, 25(5), 605-622
  • 2020
    Foreword: Disability Studies in Education—Critical Conversations, Canadian Journal of Disability Studies, Special Issue on Disability Studies in Education, 9(5), 1-19
  • 2020
    Making spaces: Multimedia storytelling as reflexive, creative praxis, Qualitative Research in Psychology, 17(2), 222-239
  • 2020
    Living dis/artfully with and in illness, Journal of Medical Humanities, 41, 395-410
  • 2019
    Beyond disordered brains and mother blame: Critical issues in autism and mothering. In L. O. Hallstein, A. O’Reilly, and M. Vandenbeld Giles (Eds.). Routledge Motherhood Com-panion (pp. 205-214)., Routledge
  • 2018
    Disturbing behaviours: O Ivar Lovaas and the queer history of autism science, Catalyst: Feminism, Theory, Technoscience, 4(2)
  • 2017
    Introduction: Cripping care—Care pedagogies and practices, Review of Disability Studies, 13(4), 1-12
  • 2014
    Refrigerator mothers, Journal of the Motherhood Initiative, 5(1), 94-114
  • 2013
    Problematising inclusion: education and the question of autism. In M. Murphy (Ed.). Social Theory and Education Research Volume 1: Inequality, Inclusion and Education (pp. 63-69), Sage
  • 2013
    As if you have a choice: Autism mothers and the remaking of the human, Health, Culture and Society, 5, 167-81
  • 2010
    Problematising inclusion: Education and the question of autism, Pedagogy, Culture & Society, 18, 105-121

Grants and Contracts

  • 2025
    Telling Our Stories: A Photovoice Project with Autistic Youth in Northern Ontario
    Role:
    Director
    Funding Source:
    Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
  • 2024
    Desiring Autism and Neurodivergence: Critical, Creative, Decolonizing and Intersectional Approaches
    Role:
    Director
    Funding Source:
    Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
  • 2023
    Awards to Scholarly Publications Program Unmothering autism: Ethical disruptions and affirming care
    Role:
    PI
    Funding Source:
    SSHRC
  • 2022
    Exploring Indigenous Understandings of Autism
    Role:
    Director
    Funding Source:
    MITACS
  • 2022
    Tired of spinning plates: an exploration of the mental health experiences of adults and/or older carers of adults with learning disabilities
    Role:
    Co-Applicant
    Funding Source:
    National Institute of Health and Social Care Research (NIHR)
  • 2019
    Re•Storying Autism
    Role:
    Primary Investigator
    Funding Source:
    Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada
  • 2016
    Enacting Critical Disability Communities in Education
    Role:
    Primary Investigator
    Funding Source:
    Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

Professional Memberships

  • Ontario College of Teachers
  • Canadian Society for Studies in Education
  • American Education Research Association

Contact Patty for

  • General
  • Media request
  • Speaking request
  • Consulting / Advising
  • Research collaboration
  • Research supervision