Goetheanum | Contributions of Adults with Support Needs for Their Social Environment

About the job

Contributions of adults with support needs for their social environment

People with support needs still experience discrimination and exclusion today. It is relevant for social coexistence to know, acknowledge, and make visible their contributions to the social environment.

Empirical experience shows: People with support needs open up new perspectives and impulses for overcoming societal challenges of living together. The questions raised in the research project are clarified from the perspective and self-perception of people with support needs as well as from statements of the professional support environment of anthroposophical institutions.

Additionally, the question arises as to how this process relates to the professional self-understanding and image of humanity in anthroposophically based curative and social pedagogy. The anthroposophically oriented approaches are based on the self-understanding of an encounter at eye level, dialogical relationship design, mutual developmental impulses, and making visible the contributions of people with support needs.

Addressing misconceptions

In the form of a study, a contribution is to be made to increase the equal recognition of people with support needs and thus counteract prejudices, misconceptions, and associated disadvantages. At the same time, the study represents an inventory of the professional self-understanding and practice of the professional support environment in anthroposophical contexts.

The study includes semi-structured and guided interviews with members of the self-advocacy advisory board for people with support needs of Anthrosocial, the association for anthroposophical curative education, social pedagogy, and social psychiatry in Switzerland. To determine the perspectives of the supporting environment, employees of anthroposophically oriented institutions are interviewed.

The research project is conducted by Stefanie Schälin, cultural scientist and research associate at the Section for Curative Education and Inclusive Social Development at the Goetheanum, in cooperation with Anthrosocial and the Competence Centre for Quality of Life and Disability at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts (CH). A scientific advisory group supports the project; its members include: Jan Göschel (section leader), Stefania Calabrese (professor at Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts), and Clemens Wild (artist). The project runs until 2026.

Donation link Fund for Curative Education and Social Therapy Dornach (please select the appropriate note)