Centring the voices of disabled LGBT+ young people in research

Young disabled LGBT+ people often face multi-dimensional discrimination and exclusion in their everyday lives. In addition, until very recently this group have also been denied opportunities to share their experiences and have not been afforded attention within research agendas. This chapter offers an honest account of some of the considerations, challenges and successes of researching alongside LGBT+ disabled young people. As an emerging area of research, the chapter provides an opportunity to reflect on how we can ensure that this group of young people and their voices remain central to the research agenda and emerging debates in this field. It explores issues of power and control, and how it is important that we take the lead and learn from young people in order to make research accessible, meaningful and impactful for this group. The chapter begins with an exploration of disabled childhood studies, arguing that it is important to examine intersectionality in the lives of disabled children. We then move to explore sexuality in the lives of disabled young people in order to highlight the key challenges they face in expressing their sexual identities. The remainder of the chapter provides an overview of our ongoing work, highlighting the challenges and successes we have encountered and the areas in which specific thought and challenge needs to be applied.