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The term "inclusive education" has become a frequently used keyword for research due to the aim of achieving inclusivity in education and society. The term is used and translated in and across global documents that shape national policy and research as well as international research. The popularity, but also the emergency of, inclusion thus yields to international research that takes place in a multilingual context. However, this goes beyond the ability to speak such languages or translate research findings correctly. In this article, we will discuss the barriers toward translating "inclusive education" as a challenging concept across different languages and cultures. As an increasingly popular concept, "inclusion" is encountered as the topic of several studies from multiple disciplines. Transferring the meaning of "inclusion" can be challenging due to the global usage of the concept in several contexts. However, there are challenges even when the issue is confined to the educational context. This article will tackle the ways used to validate the translation based on three cases derived from three studies, respectively, international research set in multiple country contexts, research translating sign languages into written language, and multilingual research in a national context. The first case will focus on the barriers due to the cultural discrepancies between written and sign languages by concentrating on the pragmatic usages of "inclusive education" in Deaf culture in Austria, while the second case examines translingual processes while conducting research on "inclusive education" within the collaboration of Austria and Thailand and presenting research findings in native languages and English. The third case will tackle multilingual and multicultural research on "inclusive education" conducted with migrants in Austria.

Although Austrian statistics inform about the distribution of students among different school types based on either their special education needs or their (forced) migration background, the group facing the disadvantages of both situations is almost invisible in the national context. There is a lack of data about the intersection of the kind of schooling (integrative setting, inclusive settings, or special education classes), gender, nationality, or first language use. In order to learn about the current educational practices and challenges in the Austrian context, parents of disabled children from a refugee background as well as educational experts and school authorities were interviewed. Findings showed that there is only a little awareness of the intersectional aspects of disability and forced migration among educational experts and school authorities, while the diagnosis of special education needs suffers from the complexity of the situation. Additionally, parents' lack of information, as well as the need to improve collaboration and increase the availability of translation services, multilingual counseling, or service provision in general were other aspects that this study found. Parents perceived school choice as a key decision and findings underlined that their worries, also as a result of past experiences, affected current decision-making regarding their children's education.

This article looks deeper into the educational careers and barriers faced by internationally trained teachers with refugee backgrounds. Highly skilled teachers experience among others formal barriers due to the two-subject regime in Austria. This study analyses the barriers and measures that disable or enable the requalification of internationally trained teachers who wish to continue their profession in Austria. Guided by a participatory approach laid out by Von Unger in 2014, this study taps into the needs of teaching professionals with refugee backgrounds and led to the development and implementation of a course. The course was compiled to provide educational knowledge as well as pedagogical training. Even though the completed subject of internationally trained teachers was recognised (apart from courses concerning didactics), the fulfilment of regular teacher training in Austria is seen as a "conditio sine qua non." Hence, teachers with a different formal-educational background, irrespective of professional expertise, are seen as lacking education and/or skills. Considering that there is no worldwide consensus regarding the content and structure of teacher education, the implication of a lack of skills as well as the need for bridging programmes will be critically discussed from the participants' perspectives. This article offers insight into the transcultural implications of professionalism.

In the year 2015, Austria was one of the main European destinations of displaced persons. According to education authorities around 15,000 children with a forced migration background of school age who arrived in Austria over the course of a few months from late 2015 to the beginning of 2016 called for immediate and partly temporary solutions. Due to Austrian legislation and unlike other countries, every child living in Austria between the ages of six to fifteen (or for nine years of schooling) is entitled to receive compulsory education. Though the school administration of Vienna generally promotes an inclusive approach to education in regular schools, schools in neighbourhoods with a large refugee population were reportedly unable to provide appropriate and adequate education for all children. In response, the local school authority in Vienna decided to establish temporary classrooms in refugee accommodations. This article describes and analyses the emergence of new educational structures from the point of view of university students and lecturers who took part in the one and a half years of its implementation. The article thereby aims to document specific perspectives on educational emergency measures at a certain point of time. In both the primary and secondary sectors, the emergence of a new temporary field of specialised and exceptional education were observed and recorded in a thick description of dynamic processes of trans-institutional, trans-organisational, transprofessional, communal, and individual development. Thus, the article presents a multifaceted picture of problems in refugee education under exceptional circumstances. The findings illustrate how insufficient educational opportunities for those falling outside the age of compulsory schooling -- in particular, preschool children as well as youth older than fifteen -- diminish possibilities for the inclusion of these children within and beyond education.

This paper is concerned with the developments of inclusive education policies and their impact on teacher education in Austria today. As we argue, most policies concerning inclusive education are still reduced to a focus on disability. Such an approach can be explained, but not legitimised, by the historical development of the education of students with disabilities, which engendered specific tendencies in the evolution of policies of inclusive education and teacher education for inclusion. This policy evolution can be divided into three phases, which we analyse in detail in this paper: (1) the building of the special school system (the 1960s to mid 1980s), (2) establishing 'integrative education' structures and practices (mid 1980s-mid 2000s), and (3) efforts to make the Austrian education system more inclusive (2007 until today). The recent phase included a reform of teacher education for inclusive education, which, on the one hand, supports specific aspects of inclusive education, but, on the other hand, is still influenced by individual model discourses, rooted in the 1960s, such as binary groupings of students (dis/abled).

This paper offers first-hand accounts of refugees beyond the age of compulsory education having arrived in Austria during the last five years. Their accounts were collected using qualitative interviews and a visual method to allow for different approaches towards their educational biographies. Nine individual and two group interviews (altogether with 16 young people) were conducted, where the majority of the young refugees are from Afghani background. All interviewees were older than 16 years. In addition, five expert interviews were conducted. Their experiences having arrived in a new country, the importance of education for them, and their aspirations in the new system became visible in the interviews. Arbitrary provision and the one-sided language focus of the system present challenges to the core of a (school) system that has proved resistant to the influx of pupils from many different cultural backgrounds for years. The results of this qualitative study show that educational segregation is common for this group, including having less chances to obtain a university entrance exam.

The article dissects approaches to playfulness with persons with learning difficulties. It questions the intersection of dis/ability and play by reassessing (who determines) the role of play in people with dis/abilities' lives with a focus on discursive practices of belittlement and diagnosing, as well as the positive potential in play, such as empowerment in an inclusive game session. As part of an international research project, we facilitated an open play session and gathered data by recording it and the reflective discussions that followed. The research methodology follows a Grounded Theory approach, using Situational Analysis to map the empirical material. Initiating play and negotiating rules proved relevant throughout initial mapping. Additionally, the question of whether and how discursive practices of belittlement and diagnosing were reproduced, disrupted, and reassessed took centre stage. The findings show that both discursive practices of belittlement and positive potentials of play surfaced throughout the open play session. Play can break barriers and be practised inclusively. 'Powerful people tend to feel, do and say things in the way they are used to. In this article we call that 'dominant norms and discursive practices'. 'One of the things they are used to doing is to treat people with disabilities as children. We call that 'belittling'. We need to be alert and self-critical, without shame, in trying to feel, talk and act inclusively. Together we can change how we used to feel, do and say things and enable inclusion and empowerment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper intends to explore the levels of availability and restrictions in relation to the use of ICTs (information and communication technologies) for educating children with disabilities in Thailand's and Ethiopia's capitals. Design/methodology/approach: In the course of an international research project, parents and teachers of children with different disabilities, the children themselves and further experts were interviewed about barriers and facilitators in the children's educational environment. For this paper only selected interviews focusing on sensory disabilities were analysed regarding the above mentioned areas of using ICTs. Findings: ICTs are available in the respective cities. The levels of restrictions related to the socio-economic situation in the two cities vary accordingly but show the same overall limitations. The intensity and kind of use of ICTs is strongly related to resources, the educational actors' awareness and knowledge. Originality/value: Approaching the topic of ICTs in relation to disability might not be new, neither is the contextualisation with the Majority World. However, the combination of the three aspects against the background of current global developments (e.g. the growing gap between the poor and the rich) reveals the importance of taking a closer look at special needs education and ICTs in the Majority World. This opens the floor for discussion on how inclusion of the most marginalised groups in education affects development in general. (Contains 5 notes.)