Paper short abstract:

This presentation explores awareness and perspectives amongst head teachers, teachers, special educators, counsellors, parents and private specialists, about children with the disability autism in mainstream educational settings in urban India.

Paper long abstract:

Little is known about children on the autism spectrum in mainstream educational settings in India. This article explores awareness and perspectives amongst head teachers, teachers, special educators, counsellors, parents and private specialists, about children with autism in an urban school context. Using an interpretive framework, it draws on interview data from an ethnographic study conducted in the metropolitan city of Kolkata. Results indicated low awareness of autism among school staff. Teachers described a child with autism as 'different' from the peers and gave little attention to understanding autism. In turn they failed to recognize how characteristics associated with autism played a central role in the child's behaviour and academic performance. Further, there was a difference in stakeholders' view on the challenges faced by the child with autism. In contrast to parents and specialists, school staff gave little importance to social development and perceived behaviour and personality differences as inherent in the child. Nevertheless, there was a consensus among stakeholders on schools responsibility as limited to academic input. These findings are discussed in relation to assumptions underlying 'different' and beliefs about the role of school.