CULTURAL HABITUS AND THE FORMATIVE AND PERFORMATIVE PROCESSES IN THE INCLUSION OF PEOPLE WITH VISUAL DISABILITIES IN CULTURAL SPACES

Abstract

This article analyzes the accessibility and inclusion of people with visual disabilities in cultural spaces from a perspective that goes beyond a mere understanding of necessary technical adaptations, proposing instead to understand it as a lived experience embedded in broader formative and performative processes. Starting from a critique of traditional models of inclusion, it argues that accessibility and inclusion practices should be marked by the centrality of the perspective of those who live these experiences, and by specific cultural dispositions. Based on the notion of habitus (Bourdieu; Passeron, 1964; Bourdieu, 1998), the social and symbolic dimensions that condition the access and participation of visually impaired people in art and cultural spaces are highlighted. In dialogue with (auto)biographical approaches, the article supports the importance of narratives as a way to access the experiences of subjects and understand how they construct meaning in contexts of inclusion and exclusion. Methodologically, this is a theoretical-analytical study that articulates contributions from the field of education, such as the concept of formative and performative processes (Gabriel, 2011), cultural studies, such as cultural habitus (Bourdieu; Passeron, 1964; Bourdieu, 1998), and (auto)biographical approaches. As a contribution, it proposes a shift from accessibility as a resource to accessibility as a relational and co-constructed practice, capable of reconfiguring cultural experiences based on the plurality of modes of perception and interpretation.