Autism as Neurodiversity: Scholarship, Politics, and Culture

3 credits · Graduate

This seminar examines the emerging concepts of neurodiversity and neurodivergence—terms originally developed by autistic activists and self-advocates seeking to depathologize autism and other forms of neurological, mental, and cognitive difference. Readings will incorporate perspectives from a wide range of research programs, including disability studies, anthropology, rhetoric, and critical theory. We will focus in particular on semiosis and consider how neurodiversity sensibility subverts traditional interpretations of autistic language as dysfunctional and noncommunicative.