Abstract
This paper introduces Critical Suicidology to higher education, exploring how this perspective can help understand and prevent college student suicide. Critical Suicidology critiques the creation of truth and knowledge in the study of suicide and demonstrates that suicide has been socially constructed. Assumptions within extant literature limit our understanding of suicide and preclude critical examination into the role of higher education on suicidal thoughts among college students, particularly those from marginalized populations. This paper argues that higher education scholars’ contextual knowledge of the student experience can engender critical studies that explore college student suicide within the context of higher education, examining the role of structural inequalities on the experience of suicide in college. Higher education scholarship on this topic can help create suicide prevention programs that affect social change and remain responsive to the needs of marginalized student populations, many of whom are disproportionately affected by suicide and suicidal thoughts.
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Recommended Citation
Kaler, Lisa S.
(2020)
"Rethinking the Study of College Student Suicide: Critical Suicidology and Higher Education,"
Journal of Critical Scholarship on Higher Education and Student Affairs: Vol. 5
:
Iss.
2
, Article 5.
Available at:
https://ecommons.luc.edu/jcshesa/vol5/iss2/5
Research-in-Brief for MS 1139