Do you know me? Analyzing the representations of disability and disabled people in textbooks of english for the secondary stage in the NCERT syllabus of India

Inclusive education depends not only on integrating disabled children into mainstream classrooms, but also on preparing non-disabled peers to develop empathy and counteract ableist stereotypes. School textbooks play a central role in shaping such dispositions. This study aims to systematically examine how disability and disabled individuals are represented in NCERT English textbooks for Classes IX–XII through a mixed-methods content analysis that combines quantitative proto-text analysis with qualitative interpretation using Longwe's empowerment framework. The study first conducts a quantitative content analysis of characters and image content, followed by a qualitative microanalysis using an adapted version of Sara Longwe's empowerment framework to assess the depth, agency, and verbo-visual dimensions of disability portrayals. Across both the texts and the images, representations of disability were limited, with most depictions remaining narrow, stereotypical, or confined to visible impairments, while hidden disabilities were largely absent. Longwe mapping indicated that portrayals rarely progressed beyond the “welfare” or “access” levels. The paper concludes with practical recommendations: expanding disability-related content, integrating richer verbo-visual depictions, including hidden disabilities, and adopting guidelines that foreground agency, inclusion, and non-deficit framing in future NCERT editions.