Cripping Narrative: Stories of Student Involvement and Stuttering

Cocurricular involvement is frequently positioned as an important aspect of the collegiate experience. Yet, some scholars have questioned which students are omitted from the existing narratives on cocurricular involvement. To address this gap, we use disabled (i.e., crip) ways of knowing to understand the less frequently told stories of involvement. Disabled students are an important aspect of diversity, and these students may have different higher education experiences because institutions often do not provide cocurricular accommodations. Disability is multifaceted; speech disfluencies—commonly known as stuttering—are an understudied aspect of diversity within disability. The purpose of this crip narrative inquiry was to explore the cocurricular experiences of persons who stutter (PWS). Our findings suggest that PWS experience interpersonal and institutional ableism; within cocurricular spaces, the lack of accommodations leads to exclusion. PWS also had their voices silenced by their peers, and PWS of color experienced aggressions at the intersection of racism and ableism. Our findings confirm the existing literature; disabled students may need more time to participate and make intentional decisions about how and when to use their limited energy. We also extend the literature by showing how the difficult and unpleasant aspects of disability (i.e., crip negativity) function within students’ lived experiences. We suggest scholars consider that involvement in student organizations does not always cultivate community or lead to a sense of belonging. Rather, for participants in this study, cocurricular involvement resulted in feelings of isolation. Thus, higher education scholars must think critically about normative narratives of student involvement.