Degrees and Certifications

• Ph.D., Michigan State University
• M.Ed., Wayne State University

Responsibilities

Research and Teaching

Academic Interests

• Inclusive Education
• Critical Disability Studies
• Feminist Poststructuralism & New Materialism

Biography

Dr. Gabel (she, her, hers) was a public school special education teacher for 15 years, during which she taught in Michigan and Kentucky. Her school teaching experience spans the full continuum of special education support services, including segregated facilities, self-contained classrooms in regular schools, resource rooms, and full inclusion. Dr. Gabel's largest body of scholarly work is situated within disability studies in education, broadly examining the institution (e.g., education) as a site of exclusion of difference, particularly as it produces disability-as-difference. Using a social interpretation of disability, Dr. Gabel has examined the ways institutional structures produce disability. Therefore, disabled people are not the focus. Rather, the focus is on disability as it is produced by ableism. More recently, Dr. Gabel has used feminist affect theories to illustrate some consequences of ableism. Via this approach she explores the materialism of emotions produced by ableism. Most recently, Dr. Gabel reflects on a career of inclusion activism and has more questions than answers about inclusion, leaving her contemplating the implications of her scholarship and activism. In 2021 and 2022 she directed the NEH Summer Institute for Teachers, "Disability and identity in history, literature and media." 

Area of Expertise

• Inclusive curriculum and inclusive teaching
• Inclusion for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities

Research Interests

• Inclusive Education
• Critical Disability Studies in Education
• Feminist theory 

Awards

• 2018 Senior Research Fellow, School of Critical Studies in Education. University of Auckland. Auckland, New Zealand.
• 2018 Distinguished Research Scholar, School of Critical Studies in Education, University of Auckland, New Zealand
• 2012 Senior Scholar Award, Second City Conference on Disability Studies in Education
• 2005 Faculty Research Award, National-Louis University
• 2002-03 US Rehabilitation Services Administration Institute on Rehabilitation Issues Scholar (national competitive nomination & selection process)
• 1998 Irving K. Zola Emerging Scholar Award, Honorable Mention, The Society for Disability Studies (for paper from dissertation)

Grants

• 2019-2022 National Endowment for the Humanities,  K-12 Summer Institute for Teachers, & Identity in History, Literature & Media
• 2008 - 2012 US Department of Postsecondary Education, Providing Students with Disabilities a Quality Higher Education
• 2002-2004 Research Grant, Louisiana Technological University

Community Engagement Activities

President, Families First, an organization providing community living support to adults with developmental disabilities.

Presentations

• Gabel, S. L. (2018). Shatter not the branches of the tree of anger: Mothering, affect, and disability. Hypatia, 33, 3 pp 553-568.
• Gabel, S. L. (2018). Looking back, looking ahead. Invited keynote, University of Auckland. Auckland, New Zealand.
• Gabel, S. L. (2018). Opening the circle of belonging. Invited keynote presented at National Disability Leadership Summit, Sydney, Australia.
• Gabel, S. L. (2018). The circle of belonging. Invited lecture, University of Waikato, New Zealand.
• 2018 Opening the circle of belonging. University of Waikato, Waikato, New Zealand
• 2018 Inside/outside the circle of belonging, Invited keynote National Disability Leadership Summit, Sydney, Australia
• 2018 Looking back, looking ahead. Invited keynote University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
• Gabel, S. L. (2017). Landscapes of inclusion and exclusion and the affective resources of belonging. Invited keynote presented at National Disability Leadership Summit, Sydney, Australia.
• 2017 Landscapes of inclusion and exclusion and the affective resources of belonging. Invited Presige Lecture, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
•  2015 Shatter not the branches of the tree of anger. Prestige Lecture, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
•  2015 Shatter not the branches of the tree of anger. Invited Keynote, Inclusion Summit, Melbourne, Australia
• 2010 I stand here ironing. Invited Keynote, International conference, Disability Studies in Education, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
• 2010 The changing ecology of higher education, international perspectives. Invited Keynote, Conference on higher education, Flanders, Belgium

Publications

Gonzales, S., & Gabel, S. L. (2017). Exploring the complexities of CLD parent involvement: What we need to know in teacher education. International Journal of Multicultural Education, 19(2), 61-81.

DeNicolo, C., Yu, M., Crowley, C., & Gabel, S. L. (2017). Re-imagining critical care and problematizing sense of school belonging as a response to inequality for immigrants and children of immigrants. Review of Research in Education, 41(1), 500-530.

Gabel, S. L., Reid, D., Pearson, H., Ruiz, L. Hume-Dawson, R. (2016). Disability and diversity on CSU websites: A critical discourse study. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, 9(1), 64-80.

Gabel, S. L., & Kotel, K. (2015). Motherhood in the context of normative discourse: Birth stories of mothers of children with Down syndrome. Journal of Medical Humanities. DOI 10.1007/s10912-015-0367-z.

Gabel, S. L., & Miskovic, M. (2014). Discourse and the containment of disability in postsecondary education. Disability & Society, (29)7, 1145-1158. DOI: 10.1080/09687599.2014.910109.

Jalal, S., & Gabel, S. L. (2014). Physical disability, gender, and marriage in Jordanian society. The Review of Disability Studies: An International Journal, (10)1.

Connor, D. J., & Gabel, S. L. (2013). “Cripping” the curriculum through academic activism: Working toward increasing global exchanges to reframe (dis)ability and education. Equity, Excellence, and Education, 26, 1, 100-118.

Gabel, S. L., Cohen, C. J., Kotel, K., & Pearson, H. (2013). Intellectual disability and space: Critical narratives of exclusion. Intellectual and Developmental Disability, (51)1, 74-80.

Miskovic, M., & Gabel, S. L. (2012). When numbers don’t add up and words can’t explain: Challenges in defining disability in higher education. International Journal of Multiple Research Approaches, 6, 3, 233-244.

Van Hove, G., Gabel, S. L., Roets, G., Loots, G., Van Loon, J., & Devlieger, P. (2012).
Resistance and resilience in a life full of professionals and labels: Narrative snapshots of Chris. Intellectual and Developmental Disability, 50, 5, 426-435.

Curcic, S., Gabel, S., Zeitlin, V. Cribaro, S., & Glarner, C. (2011). Policy and
challenges of building schools as inclusive communities. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 15(1), 117-133.

Gabel, S. L. (2010). A disability studies framework for policy activism in postsecondary education. Journal of Postsecondary Education and Disability, 23(1), 63-71.

Gabel, S. L., Curcic, S., Powell, J., Khader, K., Albee, L. (2009). Migration and ethnic disproportionality in special education: An exploratory study. Disability and Society, 24(5), 625-640.

Peters, S. J., Gabel, S. L., & Symeonidou, S. (2009). Resistance, transformation, and the politics of hope: Imagining a way forward for the disabled people’s movement. Disability and Society, 24(5), 543-556. (Journal ranking 24/92 in social sciences. Impact factor 1.3)

Connor, D. J., Gabel, S. L., Gallagher, D. J., & Morton, M. (2009). Disability studies and inclusive education: Implications for theory, research, and practice. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 12(5), 441-457.

Gabel, S. L., and Connor, D. (2008). Theorizing disability: Implications and applications for social justice in education. In W. Ayers, T. Quinn, & D. Stovall (Eds), The handbook of social justice in education. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Gabel, S. L. (2006). Deciding who gets to decide. Disability Studies Quarterly. Spring.

Gabel, S. L., and Peters, S. (2004). Presage of a new paradigm: Beyond the social model of disability toward resistance theories of disability. Disability and Society 19, 571-596. (Listed as most cited article in journal.)

Gabel, S. L. (2004). South Asian cultural orientations toward mental retardation. Mental Retardation 42, 12-25.

Gabel, S. L. (2002). Some conceptual problems with critical pedagogy. Journal of
Curriculum Inquiry 32, 177-201.

Gabel, S. L. (2002). Troubling ethics: A rejoinder to Dillabough,” Journal of Curriculum Inquiry 32, 215-227.

Gabel, S. L. (2001). ‘I wash my face with dirty water’: Narratives of disability and pedagogy. Journal of Teacher Education 52, 31-47.

Gabel, S. L., Vyas, S., Patel, H., & Patel, S. (2001). Problems of conceptual translation in cross- cultural disability studies: A South Asian immigrant example. In B. Altman and S. Barnartt (Eds.), Exploring theories and expanding methodologies: Where we are and where we need to go, Research in Social Science and Disability, Vol. II. Thousand Oaks: Sage.

Gabel, S. L., & Danforth, S. (2001). Disability studies in education: Seizing the moment of opportunity. Disability, Culture and Education, (1)1-3.

Gabel, S. L. (1996). Inclusion and issues of the disabled identity. Disability Studies Quarterly, (16)13-17.

Gabel, S. L. (1992). Using portfolios for evaluation and instruction of written language: A journey toward the rumbling. Reading and Writing Quarterly, (8)25-40.

Gabel, S. L. (1990). Literacy around the world: A report from the world congress on reading. Michigan Reading Journal.

Gabel, S. L. (1989). Themes of disability in literature. Michigan Reading Journal.

Book Chapters and Review Essays

Gabel, S. L., Reid, D., & Pearson, H. (2017). (Dis)connect Between Disability and Diversity on California State University websites: A Discussion from a Critical Snapshot Discourse Study. In E. Kim & A. Aquino, Disability as diversity in higher education: Policies and practices to enhance student success. New York: Routledge.

Gabel, S. L. (2011). Politics of silence or politics of hope? A review essay. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 15, 2, 281-284.

Valle, J. W., & Gabel, S. L. (2010). The sirens of normative mythology: Mother narratives of engagement and resistance. In C. Dudley-Marling, pp. 187-204, Critique of the normal curve. (New York: Peter Lang.)

Owen, V., & Gabel, S. L. (2010). Lack of vision? Lack of respect? Exclusion in Illinois. In P. Smith, Ed., Whatever happened to inclusion? The place of students with intellectual disabilities in education. New York: Peter Lang.

Connor, D. J., & Gabel, S. L. (2009). Welcoming the unwelcome: Disability as diversity. In N. Hobbel & T. Chapman, Eds., Social justice in pedagogy in the United States: The practice of freedom. New York: Routledge.

Gabel, S. L., Chander, J. (2008). Inclusion in Indian education. In S. L. Gabel & S. Danforth (Eds.), Disability and the politics of education: An international reader (pp. 69-80). New York: Peter Lang.

Angarita, M. M., & Gabel, S. L. (2008). Politics, inclusion and disabled children: The Columbian context. In S. L. Gabel & S. Danforth (Eds.), Disability and the politics of education: An international reader (pp. 225-236). New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L. (2008). A model for policy activism. In S. L. Gabel & S. Danforth (Eds.), Disability and the politics of education: An international reader (pp. 311-336). New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L., & Danforth, S. (2008). Disability and the international politics of education. In S. L. Gabel & S. Danforth (Eds.), Disability studies in education: An international reader (pp. 1-18). New York: Peter Lang.

Danforth, S., and Gabel, S. L. (2006/08). Introduction, in S. Danforth & S. L. Gabel (Eds.) Vital questions for disability studies in education (pp. 1-16). New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L. (2006/08). Applying disability theory in education: NIDRRs “new paradigm of disability” as a cautionary tale. In S. Danforth & S. L. Gabel (Eds.) Vital questions for disability studies in education (pp. 179-200). New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L. (2006). Deciding who gets to decide. Disability Studies Quarterly, 28, 2.

Gabel, S. L. (2005). Social construction, mental retardation, and the stories people tell: An essay and review of the social construction of intellectual disability, by Mark Rapley. Mental Retardation 44(4).

Gabel, S. L. (2005). Introduction: Disability studies in education, in S. L. Gabel (Ed.),
Disability studies in education: Readings in theory and method. New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L. (2005). An aesthetic of disability, in S. L. Gabel (Ed.), Disability studies in education: Readings in Theory and Method. New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L. (2004). Preface and Chapter 1, “Toward an Empowered Consumer,” in 29th Institute on Rehabilitation Issues, Promoting consumer empowerment through professional rehabilitation counseling. Washington, DC: Rehabilitation Services Administration.

Gabel, S. L. (1999). Depressed and disabled: Some discursive problems with mental illness.” In M. Corker and S. French (Eds.), Disability Discourse (pp. 38-46). England: Open University Press.

Gabel, S. L. (1996). Review of Serving children with disabilities: A systematic look at the programs, by Laudan Aron, et. al., 1996, in Disability Studies Quarterly, Summer.

Gabel, S. L. (1995). Review of One blood: The Jamaican body, by Elisa Janine Sobo,
1993, in Disability Studies Quarterly.

Gabel, S. L. (1994). Intelligence testing as body ritual. In E. Makas and L. Schlesinger (Eds.), Insights and Outlooks: Current Trends in Disability Studies (pp. 29-36). Portland, ME: Edmund S. Muskie Institute of Public Affairs.

Gabel, S. L. (1994). Review of Regulating bodies: Essays in medical sociology, by
Bryan S. Turner, 1992, in Disability Studies Quarterly.

Gabel, S. L. (1993). Intelligence testing: Western ontology and control of perceived
Deviance. Disability Studies Quarterly 13, 30-32.

Textbooks

Gabel, S. L., Connor, D. J. (2014). Disability and teaching. New York: Routledge.

Edited Books

Danforth, S. & Gabel, S. L. (2016, 2nd edition). Vital questions facing disability studies in education, 2nd edition. New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L., & Danforth, S. (2008). Disability and the politics of education: An international reader. New York: Peter Lang.

Danforth, S. & Gabel, S. L. (2007). Vital questions facing disability studies in education. New York: Peter Lang.

Gabel, S. L. (2005). Disability studies in education: Readings in theory and method. New York: Peter Lang.

Courses taught by Susan L. Gabel, PhD

Winter Term 2025 (future)

• SED5130 - Teaching Students with Moderate Support Needs
• TED7060 - Inclusive Education, Curriculum and Pedagogy

Fall Term 2024 (current)

• SED5110 - Introduction to Teaching Students with Moderate/Significant Support Needs
• SED5115 - Observation and Assessment of Students with Moderate/Significant Support Needs

Winter Term 2024

• SED5130 - Teaching Students with Moderate Support Needs
• TED9130 - Doctoral Seminar in Curriculum and Instruction

Fall Term 2023

• SED7800 - Practicum in Educating Students with Disabilities
• SED7801 - Special Education Student Teaching: First Endorsement

Winter Term 2023

• TED7060 - Inclusive Education, Curriculum and Pedagogy

Fall Term 2022

• SED7800 - Practicum in Educating Students with Disabilities
• SED7801 - Special Education Student Teaching: First Endorsement

Winter Term 2022

• SED7800 - Practicum in Educating Students with Disabilities
• TED7060 - Inclusive Education, Curriculum and Pedagogy
• TED9130 - Doctoral Seminar in Curriculum and Instruction

← Return to listing