damn solidarity project
[disability, autistic, mad & neuroqueer]
neuroqueer sources
Neuroqueer: An Introduction
Nick Walker, Neurocosmopolitan
"So what were we getting at? What is neuroqueer (or neuroqueerness, or neuroqueering)?
I should first of all acknowledge that any effort to establish an “authoritative” definition of neuroqueer is in some sense inherently doomed and ridiculous, simply because the sort of people who identify as neuroqueer and engage in neuroqueering tend to be the sort of people who delight in subverting definitions, concepts, and authority.
That said, the eight-point definition that follows is the closest thing to an “authoritative” (or at least creator-authorized) definition as is ever likely to exist."
Introduction to Neuroqueer Theory
Dayllyce Potess, NeuroClastic
"I heard the term neuroqueer for the first time during one of my internet deep dives. You know the ones: you have a seemingly-simple inquiry that you decide to look into and then BAM It’s 4 am and you’ve successfully hyperfocused your way down the spiraling timeline of the JonBenet Ramsey case, convinced you’ve figured out whodunnit...
I’ve always had difficulty finding a label that represented how I identified with these two aspects of self, even though new labels were arising at a seemingly-rapid pace, nothing quite “felt” right.
When I found the term neuroqueer it seemed as though I had finally found a way of accessing that part of myself that wanted to call forth the notions of my own gender and sexuality."
Toward a Neuroqueer Future
An Interview with Nick Walker, Nick Walker & Dora M. Raymaker
"When I say that a future society that's been transformed by the neurodiversity paradigm would be a neuroqueer society, what I mean is that in such a society there would be no such thing as neurotypicality, no such thing as a “normal mind.” It would be commonplace for people to regard their own minds and embodiments as fluid and customizable, as canvases for ongoing creative experimentation, in much the same way that more and more people are doing with their genders. I should note here that part of the idea of neuroqueerness is that heteronormativity and neurotypicality are inextricably entwined with one another, and to queer one is inevitably to queer the other to some degree. In addition to embracing both gender-fluidity and neurofluidity, a neuroqueer culture would recognize gender-fluidity and neurofluidity as being entwined and as synergistically interacting with one another."
Neuroqueer Disidentification
The Disability Rights Community Was Never Mine, J. Egner (2019)
"Drawing from contemporary blog data, this article examines an emerging project termed “neuroqueer.” Neuroqueer is a collaboration of activists, academics, and bloggers engaging in online community building. Neuroqueer requires those who engage in it to disidentify from both oppressive dominant and counterculture identities that perpetuate destructive medical model discourses of cure. It is a queer/crip response to discussions about gender, sexuality, and disability as pathology that works to deconstruct normative identity categories. Blog members employ neuroqueer practices to subversively combat exclusion through rejection of able-hetero assimilation and counteridentification in favor of disidentification."
Authoring Autism
On Rhetoric and Neurological Queerness, Melanie Yergeau
"In Authoring Autism Melanie Yergeau defines neurodivergence as an identity—neuroqueerness—rather than an impairment. Using a queer theory framework, Yergeau notes the stereotypes that deny autistic people their humanity and the chance to define themselves while also challenging cognitive studies scholarship and its reification of the neurological passivity of autistics. She also critiques early intensive behavioral interventions—which have much in common with gay conversion therapy—and questions the ableist privileging of intentionality and diplomacy in rhetorical traditions. Using storying as her method, she presents an alternative view of autistic rhetoricity by foregrounding the cunning rhetorical abilities of autistics and by framing autism as a narrative condition wherein autistics are the best-equipped people to define their experience. Contending that autism represents a queer way of being that simultaneously embraces and rejects the rhetorical, Yergeau shows how autistic people queer the lines of rhetoric, humanity, and agency. In so doing, she demonstrates how an autistic rhetoric requires the reconceptualization of rhetoric’s very essence."