The majority of thinkers within the neurodiversity movement and the emerging field of Neurodiversity Studies have thus far tended to view human neurodiversity through an essentialist lens in which each individual is seen as being neurotypical because they were born neurotypical, or neurodivergent because they were born neurodivergent (or because they became neurodivergent due to some event such as trauma or illness that significantly altered their neurocognitive functioning). This essentialist understanding of neurodiversity, which we might describe as neuroessentialism, has admittedly been useful in some respects. Much of the important work of the neurodiversity movement up to the present day has proceeded from the recognition that a great many people are indeed born neurodivergent—meaning that their bodyminds are predisposed to modes of functioning that are incompatible with neuronormative performance—and that attempting to force these people to comply with the standards of neuronormative performance is harmful, unethical, and oppressive. Without this understanding, a neurodiversity movement probably wouldn’t have come into existence.
A neuroessentialist lens, however, also tends to impose artificial limitations on our sense of possibility. Here, again, we find parallels and connections between the realm of gender diversity and the realm of neurodiversity. The gender essentialist mindset, which can admit no gender possibilities other than two allegedly innate and immutable “biological sexes,” is inimical to gender creativity and to the realization of the infinite range of gender possibilities. By the same token, an overly neuroessentialist mindset—a mindset which conceives of human neurodiversity as consisting of little more than an assortment of largely innate and immutable “neurotypes” or “types of brains”—is an obstacle to the realization of the infinite range of neurocognitive possibilities, and to the realization of our full potentials for intentional creative queering of our minds.
Walker, Nick. Neuroqueer Heresies: Notes on the Neurodiversity Paradigm, Autistic, and Postnormal Possibilities (p. 172-173). Autonomous Press.
I’m not saying that it’s not potentially useful for people to recognize themselves as autistic or dyslexic or whatever. When not pathologized or stigmatized, such categories can serve a variety of important purposes—including helping people to better understand themselves, to understand and communicate about their access needs and their experiences, and to connect with and work in solidarity with others who have similar neurocognitive tendencies and needs. What I’m saying here is that we shouldn’t allow our conception of neurodiversity and its potentials to be constrained by such categories, just as we shouldn’t allow our conceptions of gender and sexuality to be constrained by the binaristic categories of male and female, or gay and straight.
Public discourses on human diversity, including the discourses on gender, sexual orientation, and neurodiversity, occur almost entirely within the framework of identity politics—a framework which is fundamentally essentialist, since it involves sorting people into identity categories which tend to be presented as largely innate and immutable. Those who are accustomed to viewing queerness through this lens are often surprised to learn that the field of Queer Theory tends to reject essentialism and thus to depart radically from the premises of identity politics.
In conceptualizing gender as being constructed through ongoing socially instilled performances which can be subverted and altered (i.e., queered), Queer Theory frames identity as a fluid byproduct of activity: gender and sexuality are first and foremost things that one does, rather than things that one is, and queer is a verb first and an adjective second. In other words, one is queer not because one was born immutably queer on some sort of essential genetic level, but because one acts in ways which queer heteronormativity (e.g., going outside the boundaries of the binary gender category to which one was assigned at birth, or engaging in non-heteronormative sexual activity).
Walker, Nick. Neuroqueer Heresies: Notes on the Neurodiversity Paradigm, Autistic Empowerment, and Postnormal Possibilities (p. 173-174). Autonomous Press.
While neurodivergent is a category of identity, neuroqueer is first and foremost a verb. Neuroqueering is a practice, or, more accurately, a continually emergent and potentially infinite array of practices—modes of creatively subversive and transformative action in which anyone can choose to engage.
Of course, neuroqueer, like queer, can also function as an identity label. But while a person can be considered neurodivergent simply by virtue of having been born that way, what makes a person neuroqueer is their choice to engage in neuroqueering. One is neuroqueer not because one was born immutably neuroqueer, but because one acts in ways which queer neuronormativity (and remember that a core principle of Neuroqueer Theory is that neuronormativity and heteronormativity are fundamentally entwined with one another, and therefore any significant queering of neuronormativity is also inevitably a queering of heteronormativity).
Walker, Nick. Neuroqueer Heresies: Notes on the Neurodiversity Paradigm, Autistic Empowerment, and Postnormal Possibilities (p. 174-175). Autonomous Press.
Finally, within the neurodiversity movement, there are still remnants of the pathology paradigm that I think need to be overcome. For instance, some neurodiversity proponents still see neurotypes as natural kinds with timeless biological essences. I hope we can overcome this kind of biological essentialism since it is theoretically untenable and in my view contributes to a lot of needlessly toxic discourse. Relatedly, we also need to have more of a widespread acknowledgement that neurotype is, to some extent, fluid, and that even neurotypicals become neurodivergent if they live long enough. Working towards a more fluid and inclusive understanding of neurological identification will, I hope, not just be more liberating for neurodivergent individuals, but also help establish how the neurodiversity paradigm will be better for everyone. After all, even neurotypicals cannot live up to the ideal of normalcy. They have closer proximity to the ideal, sure. But since nobody is wholly normal, adherence to the ideal is, I think, harmful in other ways even for those who are temporarily enabled by it.
The Neurodiversity Paradigm in Psychiatry: Robert Chapman, PhD
