Spaces of Relational Opacity – Participatory Sense-Making and the Ethics of Being With Autistic People

This publication is included in the Autistic Autism Scholarship Project. The publication reports that autistic people are authors or co-authors, without specifying their number or identifying them by name.

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Ahmetovic, M., Jaegher, H. D., Williams, G., & Grace, J. (2026). Spaces of Relational Opacity – Participatory Sense-Making and the Ethics of Being With Autistic People. Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research, 28(1), 296-308. https://doi.org/10.16993/sjdr.1472

Journal or book title
Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research
Publisher
Stockholm University Press
Volume
28
Issue
1
Pages
296-308
Publication date: 29 Jun 2026 Added to AutiHub: 7 Jul 2026 Type: Article Article language: English
Publisher source (DOI) Full text OpenAlex source

This publication is integrated into AutiHub through:

Authors

Publication authors
4
Autistic authors reported by the publication
Number not specified
  1. Melika Ahmetovic
  2. Hanne De Jaegher
  3. Gemma Williams *
  4. Joanna Grace *

Abstract

Educational research and practice are often grounded in normative assumptions about communication that prioritise rapid, transparent and neuronormative forms of interaction, constraining the recognition of neurodivergent participation. This conceptual article advances a neurodiversity-affirming framework by integrating multiple theoretical strands – participatory sense-making, embodied perception, relational opacity, Being With and embodied flow dynamics – into a coherent model that reinterprets classroom interaction as an ecological, co-creative process. Our principal contribution lies in applying this integrated framework at the level of concrete classroom mechanisms, showing how sensory ecologies, interactional pacing and embodied coordination shape opportunities for participatory sense-making. We argue that moments of communicative breakdown in mixed-neurotype settings reflect ecological misalignments and epistemic norms, rather than properties located within individuals. A further novel dimension is the cross-disciplinary analysis, bringing philosophical, empirical and educational insights into constructive dialogue to support a shift from correction toward designing inclusive environments that sustain diverse embodied rhythms and make space for non-normative forms of engagement, helping to move inclusion from ideal to practice. Lay Abstract Educational research and classroom practice often rely on narrow ideas about communication. These ideas usually value fast responses, clear verbal expression and socially ‘typical’ ways of interacting. As a result, many forms of neurodivergent participation are overlooked or misunderstood. This article argues that difficulties in classroom communication are not caused by individual neurodivergent students. Instead, they often arise from the way learning environments are designed and from expectations about how communication should look. The article brings together different ways of thinking about interaction, the body and relationships to show that learning is something people create together, over time, and through shared sensory and emotional experiences. The article introduces a new way of understanding classroom interaction by focusing on everyday features such as sensory environments, the pace of interaction and how people coordinate their movements, attention and emotions. From this perspective, moments of misunderstanding or silence are not failures but signals that the environment may not be supporting everyone equally. By combining ideas from philosophy, research and education, this article highlights the importance of designing learning spaces that allow for different communication styles, rhythms and ways of being together. The aim is to support more inclusive educational environments that value neurodivergent ways of engaging, moving inclusion from an abstract ideal into everyday practice.

Bibliography cited by this reference

Cited references are imported from external metadata sources when they are available. The list may be partial.

Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 2 Oct 2026 17:07.

Cited references
59
With a DOI
22
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
4
11 / 59 (18.6%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
37 / 59 (62.7%)
References with detected author names
25 / 59 (42.4%)
Without detected author names
34
Without a structured title
4
Without a stable identifier
37
References with raw author names still to review
1
References with external metadata lookup issues
0
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
66
From DOI or external metadata
63
From validated raw bibliography text
3
Raw names already validated
3
Raw names still to review
1
40 / 66 (60.6%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 26 / 66 (39.4%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
15 / 66 (22.7%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 15 / 40 (37.5%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 9 / 50 (18.0%).
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