Authoring Autism: On Rhetoric and Neurological Queerness (Thought in the Act)

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The introduction and the first two chapters are incredibly difficult to read, as Yergeau uses a lot of academic jargon and phrases I'd consider inaccessible.

We tout a love and acceptance of individuality but when we see something truly individualistic we yell and scream. the basic gist of the book seems to be that autistics express themselves differently than allistics.To be fair, Yergeau's book does anticipate several of these critiques-- especially the one about the navel-gazing. Yergeau (211) disrupts the gaze of medical experts and in so doing contends that the "ga(y)ze" of autism offers fruitful contributions toward reconceptualizing rhetoric in a manner that simultaneously acknowledges and refuses its current role in the exclusions of disabled peoples and in particular, autistic peoples.

To seek diagnosis for acceptance-for something like autism-flips the bird at what diagnosis generally intends. While initially a challenge to break into (at least for me, as a non-rhetorician), Yergeau's writing is intimate and entertaining, and their application of rhetorical concepts to autistic experience was a great help to my understanding. autism's dynamism and haecceity do not make it "queer" (nor do they make it "mestiza," ugh), they simply indicate its conceptual vagueness.Using storying as their method, they present 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. and, to be honest, it's made me reluctant to pursue either an unofficial or official diagnosis –– unofficial because while I too struggle with intentionality and subtext in verbal communication in particular, I do not experience the physical difficulties Yergeau charts here as part of her experience, official because the book leaves no doubt that autistic folks face very real discrimination and condescension on the basis of that diagnosis.

Yergeau wishes for us to embrace a future rhetoric full of tics and stims, and if this book is a glimpse of that future, it’s one every rhetorician should be advocating for.Perhaps you must have studied rhetoric extensively to have any chance of making much sense of this book. Autism treatment enterprises, many of which share origin stories with gay conversion therapies, enact a rehabilitative response as a means of de-queering the autist. Also, as a person who uses a screen reader (because of autism-related visual processing issues), I found it bitterly ironic how poorly formatted this book was for those who use assistive technologies.