Neurodiversity and social change
your dreams will be reduced down to breathing, and you will be grateful
The thing about not-being-a-person is: They will say those people and the price of being a person is to nod and agree that yes, those people aren’t people at all. They will have no idea who they are talking to. You yourself will start to forget, too. They will say a million small things that sow the seeds for violence done against you, and you will smile and let them. You will do math, constantly. How much do I want to be a person today? How much do I want this project to succeed? How much honesty can I afford? How much dishonesty will kill me? What is the cost of coming out? Is there a way to delay, soften, transmute? How long can I survive as half a person? Ever since the world ended ... I don't go out as much. People that I once befriended, just don't bother to stay in touch. Things that used to seem so splendid, don't really matter today. It's just as well the world ended -- it wasn't working anyway. Your dreams will be reduced down to breathing. [Read More]
Julia Bascom on 03/5/12 | 2 Comments | Read More
Publicist: Must Be Willing to Out Prominent Autistics
Author Michael Lewis, as interviewed recently on NPR’s Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me: Alright, ah, the first, first investor to make a bet that this whole subprime mortgage bond experiment was a disa...[Read More]
Mark Stairwalt on 03/31/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
The idea of evolution is often confused with Darwin’s theory of natural selection. This is in no small part because science representatives of evolutionary biology, such as Richard Dawkins, ...[Read More]
Andrew Lehman on 03/29/10 | 1 Comment | Read More
Last November while weighing in on the proposed changes to the DSM which will drop Asperger’s Syndrome as a diagnostic category, I quoted George Carlin’s take on Catholicism’s Limbo as a way to ...[Read More]
Mark Stairwalt on 03/26/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
The following is an informal continuation of Laurence Arnold's musings on autism as geography, featured recently in this space under the title Rainbows End. I suppose I ought to comment on the curr...[Read More]
Guest on 03/25/10 | No Comments | Read More
I am told I am "sick," that I am "disabled," that I am "abnormal" and that a cure is being searched for for my "condition" and others who suffer from it. So I ponder and back I trace to when I coul...[Read More]
Guest on 03/24/10 | No Comments | Read More
That I might have featured Asperger’s when I was young never crossed my mind until this year. I’d been studying autism for 12 years. Working for 12 years with the thesis that testosteron...[Read More]
Andrew Lehman on 03/22/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
Rainbows End (a landscape model of autism)
I am not a scientist; indeed like Moliere's Monsieur Jourdain I only recently discovered that I have been a Whorfian [1] relativist all my life. I am in a sense a consumer of numerous scientific and...[Read More]
Guest on 03/22/10 | No Comments | Read More
Quiet Desperation and the Larger Picture
It’s an odd business, blogging for a constituency that’s not only unaware that you exist and are writing for and about them, but also unaware that they exist and are many enough to make up a c...[Read More]
Mark Stairwalt on 03/19/10 | 4 Comments | Read More
Melting Down an Autism Stereotype
By now, I expect we've all seen plenty of articles, books, and other media depicting the "autistic meltdown," wherein a slight change in routine supposedly triggers some kind of massive brain shor...[Read More]
Guest on 03/18/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
Language, Rhetoric, and Expression: There’s Power There
Language is a peculiar thing. It can be twisted, turned, spinned, mangled, mutilated. Connotation and denotation are explicitly different things, and we rarely stick to the denotative meaning (and...[Read More]
KWombles on 03/17/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
Mark Stairwalt, one of the editors over at Shift Journal wrote an article (about me, or a previous post of mine), and brought up something I've been meaning to write about. He writes: Coincidentall...[Read More]
Clay on 03/15/10 | 4 Comments | Read More
… It’s Hard to Remember Your Original Objective Was to Drain the Swamp
(continued from When You're Up to Your A** in Alligators) With that in mind then, how to make full and best use of a site like Shift Journal? Actually a tiny, excellent example happened just thi...[Read More]
Mark Stairwalt on 03/12/10 | 4 Comments | Read More
When You’re Up to Your A** in Alligators …
One thing I’ve kept an eye on over the six months since Shift Journal launched has been, “What can we be doing here that isn’t already being done well elsewhere?” Last weekend KWombles and I e...[Read More]
Mark Stairwalt on 03/12/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
Bill Wallauer is a videographer, a colleague of Jane Goodall. Click here to read Bill’s observations of chimpanzees behaving in ways that are fascinating to consider. Bill observes males displ...[Read More]
Andrew Lehman on 03/10/10 | 1 Comment | Read More
I’d been studying Asperger’s and autism in connection to human evolution for maybe ten years before it dawned on me, after reading Michael Fitzgerald’s Autism and Creativity, that Asperge...[Read More]
Andrew Lehman on 03/8/10 | 4 Comments | Read More
Sometimes I ask for feedback on pieces I’ve written before I post them, and sometimes I’m lucky enough to get a reply that’s in itself more compelling than what I’d intended to post in the fir...[Read More]
Mark Stairwalt on 03/5/10 | 2 Comments | Read More
Diversity and Inclusion: How Society Fails Us All, How We Fail Ourselves
Leave aside for the moment your immediate foray into divisions, into the ideas of a neurodiversity movement. Leave aside for a moment the split into camps of curing and not curing, the false dichotomi...[Read More]
KWombles on 03/3/10 | 3 Comments | Read More
How far would you be willing to go for a more attractive and socially pleasing look? Would you choose to sacrifice part of your cognitive functioning, leaving your brain less able to process verba...[Read More]
Gwen McKay on 03/1/10 | No Comments | Read More
Autism has been here all along.
Considered as an evolutionary condition with far-reaching social implications, its full presence and impact remain hidden in plain sight, unrecognized and uncredited.
Part neurological mystery, part social construct, and part secret society unbeknownst even to its own members, autism does not lend itself to explanation by those who hold it apart from society, from themselves, or from consciousness itself. Definitions are revised, overhauled, and abandoned all while efforts to explore and examine this condition on its own terms are only now gaining momentum.
Shift Journal aims to showcase and encourage such efforts. Entertaining the notion of autistic as a legitimate way to be in the world, from the crossroads of theory, society, and personal experience, Shift welcomes relevant contributions from all comers.
Mark Stairwalt
Editor and Publisher
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Shift Journal founder Andrew Lehman's groundbreaking cross-disciplinary work Evolution, Autism, and Social Change draws from evolutionary biology, neuro-psychology and related fields to outline an evolutionary process complementary to natural selection that may explain some forms of autism as well as -- and perhaps more importantly -- long-term shifts in large-scale social structure. Download or purchase Evolution, Autism, and Social Change here.
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In a world which relentlessly demands practical advice for day-to-day, Shift Journal remains focused on promoting reflection and discovery. Readers however who are seeking useful information and how-to guidance assembled by a down-to-earth, conscientious and scientifically literate crew who once sought such information themselves and found it difficult to come by may find The Thinking Person's Guide to Autism to be just what they are looking for:
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New or established writers wishing to contribute original or previously published posts may use the submissions page or contact us directly.
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Autism and Empathy Thinking Person’s Guide to Autism Neurodivergent Sexuality Just Stimming Autistic Passing Project