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IntroductionResearch-based instructional strategies in physics promote active participation in collaborative activities as a primary means for students to construct understanding. Discussions of physics content are also negotiations of social relations. MethodsVideo analysis of small-group collaborative learning activities in introductory physics classrooms at three different universities, using situated learning theory analyses that include a critical consciousness lens. ResultsStudents’ ability to actively participate in sensemaking may be limited by their peripheral or marginalized position. Some people seem to be centered (or marginalized) for reasons other than the strength of their physics reasoning, and some people’s contributions are elevated (or neglected) for reasons other than their scientific merit. DiscussionSome of the behavioral patterns that we observe typify racialized and gendered interactions that are common in broader U.S. society. 

In this article, I argue that mainstream physics epistemologies and physics teaching and learning practices reify ableism, augmenting the marginalization of disabled and chronically ill people in physics. I make this claim from my standpoint as a physicist who became disabled and chronically ill when I was 2 years old.