Neurodiversity

Comments Policy (and Contributor Guidelines)

It is not an easy thing to turn down the burner on a successful alchemical setup, an opus contra naturam which has been known to actually produce gold out of base metals. Shift Journal has contribut[Read More]

Mark Stairwalt on 09/6/10 | 1 Comment | Read More

Shift Journal at One Year

Imagine … beyond the one percent of the population … with autism … another four percent … describable under the less rigorous category of the Broad Autism Phenotype … five percent for whom a[Read More]

Mark Stairwalt on 09/3/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

The Disappearance of Mystery

Modern medical science, despite having some areas in which it could stand considerable improvement, is still quite amazing when contrasted with how little our ancestors knew about the workings of the [Read More]

Gwen McKay on 09/1/10 | 3 Comments | Read More

Exploring The Social Model: Self-Determination

Autists are dis/abled. As such, our needs are not met in a neurotypical world, our human rights and freedoms are denied, and participation in the world (socialization, work, college, even communicati[Read More]

Julia Bascom on 08/30/10 | 16 Comments | Read More

On Puzzles, Privilege, and Missing Pronouns

When I read blogs by the parents of autistic children, I often happen across the puzzle metaphor. It finds its way into statements such as “My autistic daughter is such a puzzle” or “We’re st[Read More]

Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg on 08/27/10 | No Comments | Read More

More Than a Fine Line

“Men who leave their mark on the world are very often those who, being gifted and full of nervous power, are at the same time haunted and driven by a dominant idea, and are therefore within a measur[Read More]

Lili Marlene on 08/26/10 | 1 Comment | Read More

Wealth, Power, and the Future Thereof

Can American democracy survive what seems to be an alarming concentration of wealth and power? That’s a question often asked nowadays, as statistics show that income inequality has become much more[Read More]

Gwen McKay on 08/25/10 | 1 Comment | Read More

On a Countdown and Deeper Thoughts on the Autism Box People Make

It’s winking, don’t you think? Or it forgot to put makeup on one side; that’s what this sunflower makes me think. So, I thought I’d share it. One week and the girls return to [Read More]

KWombles on 08/24/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

On Intelligence, Perhaps

So I’m back in Lifeskills for a few weeks, hanging with my favorite AAC-using kids, and it’s got me thinking about the nature of intelligence and intellectual disability. And so I will ramble and[Read More]

Julia Bascom on 08/23/10 | No Comments | Read More

Sorting

“Then she led Psyche into a great chamber heaped high with mingled grain, beans, and lintels (the food of her doves), and bade her separate them all and have them ready in seemly fashion by night. [Read More]

Mark Stairwalt on 08/20/10 | No Comments | Read More

My Children Want You To Know

My children want you to know that being of few words does not mean being of little intelligence. My children want you to know that being socially awkward doesn’t mean they cannot be wonderful, kind,[Read More]

Guest on 08/19/10 | 1 Comment | Read More

Inclusive Eating

Reporting from Satire City, USA, August 2110 Advocates of inclusive eating celebrated a success today when the President signed into law the Inclusion of Disordered Eaters Act, which will provide fede[Read More]

Gwen McKay on 08/18/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

Am I More Than My Autism? I Refuse to Answer the Question

In the past week, I’ve read two articles in which mothers of autistic children wrote that their children are “more than their autism.” Something about this assertion has been bothering me, and [Read More]

Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg on 08/17/10 | 3 Comments | Read More

Human Rights And Neurodiversity

Today was supposed to be about equality, as part of a series on Exploring The Social Model, but in light of recent readings and discussions, it seems that a necessary prerequisite to a discussion of e[Read More]

Julia Bascom on 08/16/10 | 6 Comments | Read More

These Too Shall Pass

Over at Welcome to Normal, in a comments guideline that is a gem of brevity Caitlin Wray asks that commenters “Tackle issues, not people.” What I’d like to do here is remind that time has a way[Read More]

Mark Stairwalt on 08/13/10 | 5 Comments | Read More

Be the Change: How to Shift Autism into the Mainstream

I have a neighbour who can’t say “autism.” Both of us having two young kids, we had a casual chat on the lawn the other day as neighbours often do, about the usual stuff. Except of cour[Read More]

Guest on 08/12/10 | 7 Comments | Read More

Taking Flight

My daughter, who isn’t likely to get the GMC Terrain she’s been obsessing about because my husband has decided he wants to buy a Chevy Volt and save the planet, is now a college freshman. [Read More]

Gwen McKay on 08/11/10 | 4 Comments | Read More

I’ve Lost My Focus

You will have to excuse me, I’ve been out of sorts lately. The tide has gone out and I’m feeling all washed up. As I wait to pick up the kids in the car I slip into sleep-deprived but not tired dr[Read More]

Lili Marlene on 08/10/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

Goodness of Fit

This post is about pigeon holes. I have AS. I am in the process of being re-diagnosed as HFA, or Autism Spectrum Disorder, or whatever it will wind up being called on my chart given the changing term[Read More]

Julia Bascom on 08/9/10 | 1 Comment | Read More

Disabilism and the Demonization of Autistic Children

This is what we know, when you tell us of your fondest hopes and dreams for us: that your greatest wish is that one day we will cease to be, and strangers you can love will move in behind our faces. �[Read More]

Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg on 08/6/10 | 3 Comments | Read More

Requiem for a Houseplant

I have a potted plant in my dining room that mysteriously started losing its leaves sometime last year. As far as I know, it always had been watered regularly and given the proper amount of fertilize[Read More]

Gwen McKay on 08/4/10 | 4 Comments | Read More

Exploring The Social Model: Accessibility

How do we enable autistics to lead meaningful lives contributing to society as autistic people? How can society be reconfigured to encourage and allow everyone, not only the enabled neurotypicals, to[Read More]

Julia Bascom on 08/2/10 | 1 Comment | Read More

Autism’s Overton Window

I don’t think any of us would call it a game, but I’ve noticed a number of people who write or comment on autism sites seem to approach the issue of defining autism as a “zero-sum game,” in th[Read More]

Mark Stairwalt on 07/30/10 | 11 Comments | Read More

The End of Workplace Bias

As we transition from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, those who find themselves out of work are disproportionately men. The historical male advantage of physical strength has become alm[Read More]

Gwen McKay on 07/28/10 | No Comments | Read More

The Value of Ideas and the Willingness to Let Go of Certainty

I’ve been thinking about the value of ideas today. I’ve been thinking about how we parse language, how we see the world in ways that confirm our belief systems. We look for connections, f[Read More]

KWombles on 07/27/10 | No Comments | Read More

Exploring The Social Model: Introduction & Groundwork

The biggest problem I can identify in the conversation about autism today, the issue to which everything seems to boil down to, is the seeming refusal to acknowledge autism as a dis/ability—not a di[Read More]

Julia Bascom on 07/26/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

We Are the People Who …

One of the struggles autistic people have begun to join over the last decade or so is over who is to be allowed to define autism, and on what terms. Is it to be defined from the outside, by those who[Read More]

Mark Stairwalt on 07/23/10 | 8 Comments | Read More

Embracing the Social Model of Disability

I have begun writing monthly articles on disability issues for our local weekly newspaper. The following is my column for July: In my last article for The Commons, I wrote about the distance I often [Read More]

Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg on 07/22/10 | No Comments | Read More

Autistic Imagination: Nothing Is Impossible

Research on creativity has shown that autistic children, when asked to draw a person or thing that could not exist, find it very difficult to do so. Creating more realistic images, however, does not [Read More]

Gwen McKay on 07/21/10 | 2 Comments | Read More

Working, Working … In Which I Make Progress

See that gap between the second and third mulberries? That right there, my friends, is progress. It better be progress as it took a couple hours yesterday to do. I am currently fortifying myself wit[Read More]

KWombles on 07/20/10 | No Comments | Read More