Over the last decade, New York Magazine has run some excellent articles on mental health, Big Pharma, and now disability. They recently published this piece on The New Autism Rights Movement and you can get an overview of the article at the The Huffington Post. For those interested in the topic, I also recommend Richard Grinker’s new book Unstrange Minds, which examines the dual life of autism as a disease and cultural phenomena (among many other topics).
update: a comment below alerted me to this blog entry by Stanley Fish on the question of normalcy and difference, sparked, in part, by the debate over autism.
June 4, 2008 at 1:31 pm
I’m trundling my way through Unstrange Minds at the moment. Great eye opener.
Cheers
June 4, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Stanley Fish has an interesting piece in the NY Times about difference, disability and claiming one’s right to be accepted.
June 4, 2008 at 10:42 pm
Have you been able to pick up a copy of the newest documentary DVD about recovering from Autism? I read your blog and thought you might like to see this. I am truly touched by the possibilities this film shows, and the proof it displays for the ability to recover from the diagnosis of Autism.
Recovered: Journeys Through the Autism Spectrum and Back is an amazing story documenting four children who have recovered from the Autism Spectrum. The film presents documentation of therapy sessions along with interviews of the children who are now teenages, their parents, and the founder/executive director of the Center For Autism & Related Disorders, Inc. (CARD), where the four children received services.
I found it personally helpful and informative with my own situation, and it gave me the knowledge that there are specific treatments out there that do help children and give them the chance to recover.
check out the DVD at : http://www.recoveredautism.com
Warmest Wishes,
Amber
June 10, 2008 at 5:29 am
[...] Chew, over at Autism Vox, has an interesting recent post with this title. It nicely supplements Biella’s post on What Sorts last week around the related issue of the new autism rights movement, and with the [...]
June 25, 2008 at 1:46 pm
I encourage you to visit http://www.neoteny.org/?cat=7. It is an autistic empowering theory of human evolution that hypothesizes an origin of autism.
June 25, 2008 at 1:51 pm
Thanks. I will check it out.
biella