Transitions into Adulthood: Disability, Ethnicity and Gender among British South Asians

Abstract

This paper argues that the life course of disabled young people from British South Asian families is different from their siblings. The analysis focuses on the intersections between disability, ethnicity and gender in life course transitions. Education and the transition into employment are examined as key stages. Disability is established as an important influence in the way others, including the young people's parents, responded to them. Consequently, they had to negotiate transitions with their families as well as external agencies. These negotiations relate to cultural hybridity, where the desire to find a space to express a variety of different and competing identity claims is experienced differently, again in comparison to their non-disabled siblings.