Date of Award

11-2023

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Organizational Unit

Joint Ph.D. Program in Study of Religion

First Advisor

Miguel De La Torre

Second Advisor

Albert Hernández

Third Advisor

Deb Ortega

Fourth Advisor

Nick Walker

Keywords

Christian ethics, Latinx, Neurodivergent, Neurodiversity, Social ethics

Abstract

A significant problem facing neurodivergent Latinxs is the invisibility of their marginalization and oppression. Neurodivergent Latinxs are invisible in dominant society and theological discourse. While neurodivergence and disability are not synonymous, the failure to recognize the marginalization of disability contributes to neurodivergent invisibility. Disability is depoliticized when disability is conceived as an issue of individual embodiment rather than a social issue of acceptance, accessibility, and equality. Neurodivergent Latinxs are erased, and the physical, epistemic, and institutional violence against them go unnamed.

This research project uses the hermeneutical circle for ethics in formulating praxis in combating the oppression of neurodivergent Latinxs. This methodology is used to understand neurodivergence, the nature of neurodivergent Latinxs’ oppression, how theology acts as a hindrance or a resource to their liberation, and the ways neurodivergent Latinxs resist their oppression, to construct a social ethic for disability and racial justice. This method finds an affirmation of neurodivergent personhood and that racialized neuronormativity is a system of power oppressing neurodivergent Latinxs with theology acting as a hindrance or empowerment in resisting this oppression. This leads to the final step of offering a new ethical perspective.

After going through the hermeneutical circle, this project proposes an ethic of haciendo cara as a neurodivergent Latinx liberative social ethic. This ethic borrows and expands Chicana theorist Gloria Anzaldúa’s metaphor of haciendo cara (making face). Making face is one of Anzaldúa’s metaphors for constructing identity. An ethic of haciendo cara develops this metaphor to encompass not only neurodivergent Latinxs making face, but making society. Haciendo cara reinterprets the metaphorical system of face/mask/unmasking within neurodivergent communities to face/mask/unmask/making face. Therefore, an ethic of haciendo cara is a metaphor for the praxis of neurodivergent Latinxs constructing their own identity and (re)creating society toward a more just future.

Copyright Date

11-2023

Copyright Statement / License for Reuse

All Rights Reserved
All Rights Reserved.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Rudolph P. Reyes II

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

English (eng)

Extent

209 pgs

File Size

1.1 MB

Discipline

Ethics, Hispanic American studies, Disability studies

Download

Available for download on Saturday, December 13, 2025



Share

COinS