I'm presenting my first academic paper!

(OK, it's not 100% *my* paper - it's a joint paper, which i'm half responsible for. I'm not sure if my co-writer/presenter wants hir name made public here, so will check and edit hir name in if ze is... also, my next post will be about naming, quoting and the conflict between the pseudonymity of blogging and the attribution requirements of academia...)

This is the abstract of the paper that i am (co-)presenting at the Critical Autism Seminar Day at Sheffield Hallam University on 18th January 2011:

Social dis-order: autistic experiences of/in radical political activism

The discipline of disability studies is rooted in the political struggles of disabled people to emancipate themselves from social oppression. Much has been written about the relevance of different critical theories (e.g. Marxist, feminist, queer) to the understanding and challenging of disablist oppression (ref: Oliver,1990; Morris,1991; Garland-Thompson,2005; McRuer,2006).

With an impairment-specific regard to autism, application of the social model of disability to issues of (e.g.) communication and executive function may provide radical reassessments of the fundamental "rules" of presently-existing society. Autistic people are often strongly drawn to radical political movements and/or radical/"alternative" social milieus, but also are likely to find aspects of them problematic, where disability and communication difference are not fully taken into account.

This paper seeks to explore the convergences and tensions between disability and other dimensions of oppression and liberation, and between autistic (and otherwise disabled) people's struggles and other radical social struggles, by looking at the experiences of autistic activists in radical social movements.

By looking at on-line writings of autistic social change activists and by drawing on our own experiences of anarchist, queer and feminist activism, we explore how autistic understandings of social justice and inclusion can inform, enrich, and challenge conceptual gaps within, radical politics and the social milieu associated with it.

We focus in particular on the way politics and process within the "movement of movements" (e.g. non-hierarchical organisation and consensus decision making), while seeking to destabilise power inequalities and include non-hegemonic voices, still contain normative assumptions about effective communication and the social body.

(Unfortunately i believe that places for the seminar day are already fully booked, despite the stated deadline for attendance being 6th January. However, i might be wrong there, so if you are interested in going it might still be worth contacting the organiser, Katharine Runswick-Cole, at k.runswick-cole@mmu.ac.uk.)

To give other autistic people who are involved in radical activism an opportunity to contribute anecdotes or opinions that we may use in the paper, i am sending out a list of questions to those who i know and asking them to pass them on to any others they know. (These don't constitute any sort of statistical survey, but just a jumping-off point for writing about experiences and perspectives.) If anyone reading this wants to answer the below questions, please email me your responses (or post in comments if you don't mind them being publicly visible), and say if you want me to attribute anything i end up quoting in the paper.

1) How would you choose to identify in terms of your neurology (eg. autistic, Asperger's, "cousin", self-diagnosed autistic, etc.) (multiple answers acceptable!)

2) Do you identify with a particular political "label" (eg. Marxist, anarchist, radical feminist, deep ecologist, etc.) (multiple answers acceptable!)

3) What drew you to radical social activism?

4) Do you think that there is a connection between your neurodiversity and your activism? If so, what do you think that connection is?

5) Can you describe any particular experiences (whether positive or negative) of being autistic in radical spaces that stand out to you?

6) Do you think that the radical social movements you are involved in are a) aware of autism and what it means and b) accepting of autistic people? If not, why not?

7) Do you think that radical social movements/spaces tend to provide an environment that is better or worse suited to autistic people than mainstream political society? If so, why? If not, why not?

8) Is there anything else you can think of in your personal experience that is not covered by the above questions, but is relevant to this paper?

I'm incredibly excited about getting to present this paper - it fits perfectly into one of the main things i'm currently perseverating on, trying to make connections and break down barriers between academic research and grass-roots activism. Watch this space for further developments.