DEADLINE EXTENDED: April 15, 2026

Issue: Transformative inclusive pedagogies

In this peer-reviewed issue of the  Journal of Childhoods and Pedagogies, we create space for inquiries and dialogues with social justice, inclusive practices, and disability studies in early childhood care and education (ECCE). The issue aims to contribute to and expand reconceptualist perspectives in ECCE that challenge the dominance of neoliberal education, biomedical and deficit discourses of disability, and the primacy of child developmental psychology and other colonial discourses. We ask, 

What would become possible in pedagogical encounters sustained within practices of the ethics of care with children through a lens of social justice and inclusion? 

How could notions of interdependence destabilize power structures fomented by deficit perspectives and invite inclusive pedagogies that are more reciprocal, relational and responsible?  

What it might mean to create a space where differences and otherness could co-exist?

How have projects of social justice in education been challenging violent colonial discourses and neoliberal policies?

Submissions should reflect critical engagements with critical and reconceptualist perspectives in education. The issue holds a special interest in multidisciplinary and intersectional stories, histories, and scholarship of/with marginalized communities. We invite contributions that elaborate on perspectives in social justice education stemming from Indigenous studies, childhood studies, critical disability studies, critical race studies, gender studies, among others. We are particularly interested in expanded dialogues grounded in postfoundational theories and more-than-Western perspectives/ worldviews.  

We welcome submissions in multiple formats and languages. Contributions can include but are not limited to first-person stories and/or family stories, research papers, literature reviews, historical studies, speculative papers, book reviews, and arts-based pieces - including multimedia formats (video-performances, arts/music composition, animations, video storying, etc.). 

Editors

Caroline Brendel Pacheco and Dr. Shawna M. Carroll



 

References or Openings

Berne, P. (Spring/Summer 2018). Ten principles of disability justice. WSQ: Women’s Studies Quarterly, 46(1&2), 227-230. 

Dahlberg, G., & Moss, P. (2005). Ethics and politics in early childhood education. Routledge Falmer.

hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to transgress: Education as the practice of freedom. Routledge.

Kumashiro, K. K. (2000). Toward a theory of anti-oppressive education. Review of Educational Research, 70(10), 25-53. https://www.jstor.org/stable/1170593

Nxumalo, F. & Brown, C. P. (Eds.). Disrupting and countering deficits in early childhood education. Routledge.  

Nxumalo, F., & Cedillo, S. (2017). Decolonizing place in early childhood studies: Thinking with Indigenous onto-epistemologies and Black feminist geographies. Global Studies of Childhood, 7(2), 99-112. https://doi.org/10.1177/2043610617703831

Shannon, D. B. (2020). Neuroqueer(ing) noise: Beyond ‘mere inclusion’ in a neurodiverse early childhood classroom. Canadian Journal of Disability Studies, 9(5), 489-514.  

Tuck, E. & Yang, K. W. (Eds.). (2018). Toward what justice? Describing diverse dreams of justice in education. Routledge

Wood, R. (2015). To be cared for and to care: Understanding theoretical conceptions of care as a framework for effective inclusion in early childhood education and care. Child Care in Practice, 21(3), 256-265.