3. Discuss the changing lexicon of ‘special education’, highlighting the relations between terminology and social practices (e.g. ‘imbecile’, ‘feebleminded’, ‘degenerate’,

‘mentally retarded’, etc., to the more recent formulations of ‘children/people with learning disabilities or specific learning difficulties’). Note that this does not involve claims that the language is being used somehow to refer to what is essentially ‘the same’ entity – this would run counter to the ideas elaborated in this chapter about the constitutive effects of psychological discourses. The purpose is not to trace continuities or homologies, but to explore the positions set out within the different practices. Indeed, the current proliferation of diagnostic labels – from ‘educational and behavioural difficulties’ to specific learning difficulties – including autism, dyslexia, Asperger’s, dyspraxia and the like testify to a more fragmented, ‘specialised’ and hardwired set of classifications.