SSR Seminar Series: “They Made Fun of Me for Being Different”: Experiences and Impacts of Childhood Bullying Among Young Persons with Disabilities in Singapore
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- This is a physical seminar event.
- Registration slots will be assigned on a first-come, first served basis.
- Please register by 2 July 2025. Successful registrants will be informed from 3 July 2025 via email.
- Unsuccessful registrants will be placed on a waitlist and will be informed via email should a place be made available.
- In the event when you cannot make it after receiving the email confirmation, please let us know as soon as possible via email so that others can get a chance to attend the event.
Seminar Details
Young persons with disabilities (YPWDs) are disproportionately targeted by bias-based bullying due to perceived differences, entrenched stigma, and systemic ableism. Despite growing global attention, there is limited qualitative research from non-Western contexts that centers the voices of YPWDs themselves. This phenomenological study draws on retrospective narratives from 22 young adults in Singapore who experienced bias-based bullying and cyberbullying during childhood and adolescence. This study highlights how bias-based bullying was experienced through chronic, intersecting forms of harm, both overt and subtle. While many reflected on the lasting emotional and functional consequences of these experiences, several also shared moments of resistance and self-advocacy. These acts of resistance emerged not only as coping strategies, but as powerful expressions of identity reclamation and social defiance. This study disrupts pathologizing narratives of disability as deficit, and illuminates YPWDs' agency in meaning-making and resilience. These findings call for dignity-affirming approaches to support and education.
PhD Student
Factor-Inwentash Faculty of
Social Work,
University of Toronto &
Young NUS Fellow
Department of Social Work,
National University of Singapore
David Puvan (he/him) is a PhD student at the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto. He holds a Bachelor of Social Work and a Master of Social Work (by Research) from the National University of Singapore. David is also a recipient of the NUS Development Grant. His research focuses on the use of participatory arts and theatre-based approaches to build critical consciousness and promote healing among multiply marginalized communities. Committed to research as a form of praxis and a platform to amplify silenced voices, David is actively engaged in qualitative research in the areas of bullying, violence, minority-stress and mental-wellbeing. Outside of research, David is also a trained applied theatre practitioner (specifically Theatre of the Oppressed) and facilitates workshops that use theatre games and exercises for reflection, dialogue, and community-building.
Assistant Professor in
Disability Communication,
Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information,
Nanyang Technological University
Kuansong Victor, Zhuang is Assistant Professor in Disability Communication at the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University. Prior to joining academia, Victor worked at SG Enable, the national agency for disability for over 7 years. He was a UK Chevening scholar in 2013/14, a 2022/23 Princeton University Fung Global Fellow and a visiting fellow at the University of Sydney in 2023/24. His research lies at the intersections of communications, media, and cultural studies, and disability studies, especially as it pertains to inclusion and the workings of technology. He hopes to use his research to contribute to current debates about how inclusion happens both in Singapore and around the world.
Find out more about his work at www.ksvictorzhuang.com