Living conditions of Mixe and Nahua children with disabilities
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Abstract
Indigenous children and adolescents with disabilities face multiple forms of structural violence that impact their living conditions. Using an ethnographic methodology, this study recovers the voices, gestures, and experiences of caregivers, and of Indigenous children and adolescents with disabilities, määt jääy (Mixe) and ihtlakahketsih (Nahua), from Oaxaca and the Huasteca Potosina, Mexico. Findings reveal that, in the face of structural precarity, families enact care practices that sustain life. The agency of children and adolescents is highlighted, as they engage in bodily, playful, and territorial practice, such as play, dance, and collective work, to reconfigure the meanings of disability. The
study underscores the urgency of public policies that recognize their voices, value their practices, and strengthen local care networks. Indigenous children and adolescents with disabilities are active participants in the production of knowledge and the transmission of community knowledge.
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