“When Father Christmas is the gaslighter”: how special education systems make (m)others ‘mad’

This paper is written with, by and for (m)others whose children have been labelled as having ‘special educational needs’ (SEN). We use the term (m)others to pay attention to the continued impact of the gendered nature of care for (disabled) children at the level of the individual, but also to recognize gender as a social construct, and the many ways of being a (m)other (Anderson). Our broad aim is to explore the ways in which special education systems across the global North construct (m)others of disabled children as ‘mad’. This discussion is timely given the high levels of conflict between parents/carers and global North special education systems in contemporary times. We explore ‘madness’ as a mechanism of social control produced in special education systems by paying close attention to what we describe below as ‘intimate encounters’ between (m)others and practitioners that occur dayto-day in (special) education settings. The developing analysis is shaped by the concept of ‘gaslighting’ which, we argue, offers a useful framework both for understanding deeply affecting and effecting ‘intimate encounters’ between (m)others and practitioners and for exposing the operations of power in special education systems. We conclude by reflecting on what new understandings of (m)others’ madness have been revealed and how they have the potential to (re)shape practice.