Glossary
Develop a Language in Which We Can Both Understand and Challenge the World
The shift from the pathology paradigm to the neurodiversity paradigm calls for a radical shift in language, because the appropriate language for discussing medical problems is quite different from the appropriate language for discussing diversity.
THROW AWAY THE MASTER’S TOOLS: LIBERATING OURSELVES FROM THE PATHOLOGY PARADIGM
In politics our frames shape our social policies and the institutions we form to carry out policies. To change our frames is to change all of this. Reframing is social change.
The ALL NEW Don’t Think of an Elephant!: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate
When we successfully reframe public discourse, we change the way the public sees the world. We change what counts as common sense. Because language activates frames, new language is required for new frames. Thinking differently requires speaking differently.
Terror comes in many forms and one powerful expression is when people become too fearful to develop a language in which they can both understand and challenge the world in which they live. Not only does such linguistic deprivation fail to ward off the plague of propaganda, but it also contributes ‘to an annihilation of the self and the destruction of the capacity to recognize the real world’.
Giroux, Henry A.. Pedagogy of Resistance (p. 31). Bloomsbury Publishing.
Language is also a place of struggle.
—bell hooks, Choosing the Margin as a Space of Radical Openness
“Language is also a place of struggle.” “Thinking differently requires speaking differently.” “Develop a language in which they can both understand and challenge the world in which they live.”
People often take issue against the terms used by marginalized people. We experience this in our advocacy regarding Identity First Language and the terms neurodivergent and neurotypical. These terms were coined to examine power and privilege, which is exactly what some don’t like about them.
Our glossary grows rapidly. We’re defining the small truths and the big truths of our daily existence.
Post-truth is pre-fascism.
Snyder, Timothy. On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century (p. 71). Crown/Archetype. Kindle Edition.
“Language is also a place of struggle.”
“Thinking differently requires speaking differently.“
“Develop a language in which they can both understand and challenge the world in which they live.”
All Glossary Entries
- Ableism
- Abraction
- Acceptance
- Access Intimacy
- Accommodation
- ActuallyAutistic
- Addiction
- ADHD Tax
- Advice Process
- Alexithymia
- Algorithm
- Alien
- Allistic
- Aloneness
- Alt Text
- Alternative and Augmentative Communication
- Altruism
- Americans with Disabilities Act
- Anarchism
- Anti-library
- Art
- Artificial Intelligence
- Asynchronous Communication
- Autigender
- Autism
- Autism Warrior Parent
- Autistic Language Hypothesis
- Autistic Rhizome
- Canary
- Care
- Cavendish Space
- Caves, Campfires, and Watering Holes
- Change
- Checklists
- Childism
- Chosen Family
- Chronic
- Clumping
- Co-regulation
- Coddle
- Code
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
- Cognitive Liberty
- Collaborative Morality
- Comedy
- Commonplace Book
- Community
- Compassion
- Competency Network
- Conceptual Portmanteau
- Concision
- Constructionism
- Created Serendipity
- Crip
- Crip Linguistics
- Crip Tax
- Crip Time
- Cripple Punk
- Critical Race Theory
- Critical Thinking
- Critical Wellness
- Cyborg
- Dandelions, Tulips, and Orchids
- DARVO
- Data Void
- Deep Pressure
- Deficit Ideology
- Demand Avoidance
- Design Justice
- Design Questioning
- Diagnosis
- Dialectical Behaviour Therapy
- Different
- Differentiated Instruction
- Digital Sociology
- Disability Dongle
- Disability Justice
- Disabled
- DisCrit
- Diversity
- Dolphining
- Double Empathy Problem
- Dyslexia
- Neoliberalism
- Neuro-anarchy
- Neuroaffirming
- Neurocentrism
- Neuroception
- Neurocosmopolitanism
- Neurocousin
- NeurodiVenture
- Neurodivergent
- Neurodiversity
- Neuroessentialism
- Neurokin
- Neurological Pluralism
- Neurominority
- Neuronormativity
- Neuroqueer
- Neurospicy
- Neurotype
- Neurotypical
- Niche Construction
- Noncompliance
- Nonspeaking
- Normal
- Samefood
- School-Induced Anxiety
- Scientism
- Self-Determination Theory
- Self-Injurious Stimming
- Self-Organizing
- Semiotic Domains
- Sensory Hell
- Sensory Trauma
- Shame
- Situational Mutism
- Sleep
- Slow Pedagogy
- Social Model of Disability
- Solarpunk
- Somatic
- Space Bunny
- Space Holder
- Spaced Repetition
- Special Interest
- Special Needs
- Spiky Profile
- Spoon Theory
- Stigma
- Stimming
- Stimpunk
- Strategic Essentialism
- Straws
- Structural Ideology
- Subtype
- Support Swapping
Essential Neurodiversity Vocabulary: The Good, The Bad, The Different
Latest Glossary Terms
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Writing
Writing is communication. If you’re trying to convey a specific message to a specific audience to fulfill a specific purpose, you’re writing Warner, John. The Writer’s Practice: Building Confidence in Your Nonfiction Writing (p. 6). Penguin Publishing Group. [W]e should teach unfinished writing and glory in its unfinishedness. We work with language in action… The…
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ActuallyAutistic
The #ActuallyAutistic hashtag was created as an alternative to the #autism hashtag to be for blogs or blog posts created by autistic people. How the ActuallyAutistic hashtag is used on the Art of Autism | The Art of Autism A common question from those new to the ActuallyAutistic hashtag is: “is it inclusive of self-diagnosis?” Yes,…
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Neoliberalism
The basic idea of neoliberalism, as summarised by David Harvey, was that ‘human well-being can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills within an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade’. In practice this meant privatisation, deregulation, and austerity. Empire of Normality: Neurodiversity and Capitalism by…
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Posthumanism
Posthumanism is a broad philosophical school with various interpretations in different disciplines. It is not possible to elaborate on all aspects of posthumanism in this article. I therefore draw on three salient principles of posthuman theories that are relevant to this study on inclusion. Firstly, posthuman perspectives adopt a worldview in which ideas about the…
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Flexibility
Flexibility makes a big difference in inclusion. Disabled People Have WFH For Years. Companies Catch Up There is no one size fits all when it comes to accessibility. Instead of choosing who to prioritize and counting tradeoffs for certain choices like universal high contrast mode, the obvious solution would be to let the user choose. Similar…
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Toxic Positivity
“Saying ‘be positive’ marginalizes and isolates people,” she said. “I’m autistic, I have depression and anxiety and I’ve been diagnosed with PTSD. It’s not realistic to ask me to conform to these very specific, socially valued emotions.” ‘It’s OK not to be OK’: Minnesota psychologists push back on ‘toxic positivity’ – StarTribune.com “If it works…
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Processing Time
Processing space This is the additional time required to process new information or unexpected changes. Compared to non-autistic people, making decisions, responding to questions or accepting suggestions may require longer (Royal College of Psychiatrists, 2020; Vicario et al, 2020). Understanding this aspect of autistic experience and having the patience to wait is invaluable. It may appear…
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Gendervague
More recently, I’ve started referring to myself as gendervague, a term coined within the autistic community to refer to a specifically neurodivergent experience of trans/gender identity. For many of us, gender mostly impacts our lives when projected onto us through other people’s assumptions, but holds little intrinsic meaning. Someone who is gendervague cannot separate their…
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Vocational Education
The kind of vocational education in which I am interested is not one which will “adapt” workers to the existing industrial regime; I am not sufficiently in love with the regime for that. It seems to me that the business of all who would not be educational time-servers is to resist every move in this…
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Efficiency
In the name of efficiency, we have increasingly disabled the ability of healthcare, industry, and education to carry out their missions effectively. Labaree, David. The Ironies of Schooling (p. 45). The covid-19 pandemic showed a lot of things that were wrong in American society, including terrible leadership, a frail social safety net, and a lack…
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Education
An education is the capacity to author your own life instead of merely accepting the one handed to you. What Does it Mean to Be Educated? – by ASDE Whatever an education is, it should make you a unique individual, not a conformist; it should furnish you with an original spirit with which to tackle…
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Anarchism
Anarchism is a political philosophy and practice that opposes all hierarchical power structures along with their justifying dogmas and proposes the unending pursuit of free association, self-determination, and mutual aid as the basis of our society. Our critique of the state is an extension of our critique of hierarchical power structures, or hierarchies, and the…
