Over and Over and Over: A Continued Call for Autistic Voices

As an Autistic student in a master’s degree, I focused on the way expertise is understood. I was specifically interested in how policy decisions in education were made without Autistic involvement. I looked at the literature that was used to make these decisions and interviewed Autistic people as to their thoughts on who should be considered experts when it comes to autism. I found that policy was driven by experts who had little to no direct experience with autism or Autistics and who had no personal connections to the approaches they recommended. I argue that Autistic people must be involved in research design, execution, implementation, dissemination, and policy decisions.

Moving From Autism Awareness to Acceptance - Language of Inclusion

For the last 50 years, April has been celebrated as Autism Awareness Month, and media campaigns and fundraisers have occurred alongside, trying to raise “awareness” of the difficulties and challenges associated with having a family member diagnosed with autism. The stigma that “awareness” continues to foster creates real barriers for Autistics to be seen as more than a stereotype. Many Autistics believe strongly that we need to move past a time of awareness and move to a time of autism “acceptance”. Accepting who we are, and our different ways of thinking, acting, and presenting ourselves to the world. This video and associated transcript will look at how we can move from autism awareness to autism acceptance through a change in the language we use. Moving from words and thoughts that cause exclusion and segregation to words that promote inclusion and accommodation. Changing our language changes the way we think, changing the way we think, changes the way we act, and our actions can bring about change that will allow Autistics to thrive. If we change how we talk about autism in policy, in programs, in research and in media, we will change how autism is conceived of and start to see the barriers around Autistics come down.

Equity: What Model Should We Use When We Talk About Autism?

In the Canadian disability rights movement, with regards to autism specifically, there has been a shift towards recognizing what is called a social model of disability. Through this movement, there has been a desire to incorporate that model into practice in governments, institutions, and healthcare. This desire also stems from advocate-centric and first-voice communities, where disabilities like autism are not viewed through a deficit-based lens. This article aims to discuss the often polarizing social and medical models of disability, comparing their uses in the disability world while weighing their respective benefits. Finally, an alternative model of disability that intersects these models is discussed as an alternative. This model is called the International Classification of Functioning, which recognizes three levels that impair a disabled person: the body, the person, and the environment. It is from this focus that policy can be developed to answer the calls of the pan-disability movement; to provide equitable changes across services and domains that are rightly deserved for Autistic and disabled people.

Autism, Equity, and How the Journal Came to Be

Over the past year a pandemic has swept across the world and, unsurprisingly, revealed gross inequalities across all aspects of life. We saw this in the constant pandemic media coverage that overlooked the experiences of the disability community and, more specifically, the autism community, at least at first. Furthermore, let us not forget in the early days of the pandemic that in countries such as Italy, people without disabilities were prioritized for life-saving machines (Andrews et al., 2020; Lund & Ayers, 2020), contributing to a culture of fear for the one in five Canadians with a disability (Morris et al., 2018) about what would happen to them here. As COVID-19 reached Canadian shores we saw this pattern of inequity quickly replicated within our society. For instance, Canadians with developmental disabilities, such as autism, living in residential settings did not receive the same level of support as those living in different kinds of residences such as retirement residences (Abel & Lai, 2020). Likewise, the initial claims that only people with ‘preexisting conditions’ were at risk implied that those at risk were somehow less valuable to society. Nothing has highlighted the very real problem and extent of ableism within Canadian society as a whole more than these injustices arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, and this is what planted the seed for the Canadian Journal of Autism Equity (CJAE).

What is it About our Story: Does Ergodicity help us Understand Equity from a Neurodiverse Perspective?

This article explores the dynamics of equity and ergodicity in a psychological lab context including navigating consent (commitments) and transparency (debriefs). The article explores how evolutionary determinants are translated into competitive gameplay in human social interactions and how cooperative gameplay based on cultural stories counteracts harms associated with competition. Other themes that are explored is a love of learning at the center of cooperative storytelling. An Indigenous form of perspective-taking called etuaptmumk or "two-eyed seeing," developed by First Nations Mi'kmaw Elder Albert Marshall, is used as an example of ergodic intervention as a balance to cognitive biases. How are concepts of dignity and respect, as support for equity in needs, and a recognition of community member competencies and contributions, work to nurture a neurodiverse writing community where individuals can openly navigate consent, transparency, consensus, and inclusion? What are both the theoretical and practical implications of using multimodal expression such as writing on a neurodiverse community?

Towards Health Equity in a National Autism Strategy: A Lens on Disparities, Barriers, and Solutions

Health equity allows people to reach their full health potential and access and receive care that is fair and suitable to them and their needs regardless of where they live, what they have, or who they are. To achieve health equity, equity in healthcare focuses on the role of the health system to provide timely and appropriate care. When viewed in the context of a National Autism Strategy, this extends to ensuring access to the resources that each Autistic person requires to meet their health needs, such as an autism diagnosis, services, and supports. Based on the equity panel discussion held at the Canadian Autism Leadership Summit 2020, this article reflects on the current disparities and barriers to achieving health equity in a National Autism Strategy, and outlines ways to address them. Disparities to equitable care within the autism community extend from the level of support needs of an individual to how those intersect with several key determinants of health including: geography, culture, gender, and socioeconomic status. Notably, barriers arise due to a “lack of” theme, including lack of awareness, knowledge, access, and voice. Four reoccurring ideas were identified for how to address inequities in health care for Autistic people. First, allocate resources for regional or in-community endeavours; second, improve Autistic representation and connection; third, establish a community of allies to advocate and collaborate; and fourth, establish leadership within the community and government to make disability a priority for Canada. To achieve equity in health care in a National Autism Strategy, we need to look at the intersectionality of autism with the key determinants of health. Moreover, to effectively engage with the government, health professionals, and the public, the autism community should strive to find a unified and diverse voice. And finally, conversation must turn to action.

Supporting Autistic Culture in Defining Autistic Identity

Late diagnosed Autistic adults who are also practicing artists are very likely to have clues about their identities expressed in their work. This gives them the opportunity to reevaluate their meaning through a more accurate lens and proper context. It also challenges viewers and audiences to do the same and to confront misconceptions. These biases are likely to extend across all forms of cultural production. This leaves Autistic and disabled artists with a very small and unrecognized footprint in our current cultural landscape. This needs to be rectified by rejecting outmoded stereotypes and establishing committed programs of engagement with Autistic culture by our public institutions.

A Call for Expanding the Diversity of Voices in Autism Research Engagement

Recently, there has been a push to increase research engagement within the autism community. Historically, research engagement has largely focused on childhood disability research and participatory autism research remains rare (den Houting et al., 2021). This gap in the literature can often result in the substitution of parents’ voices for those of their Autistic children within the framework of family-centred services. This article argues that research engagement should be conducted in a way that can represent the wider autism community and cautions against allowing voices of one element of the autism community to speak for the whole.

Nothing to Bragg About: Examining the Search for Autistic Representation in History

Using the career of infamous Confederate General Braxton Bragg as a case study, this article poses questions about how we search for and discuss possible examples of Autistic people in history. The article contends that we need to reconsider what we hope to accomplish when posthumously diagnosing historical figures and the way in which those discussions are structured, cautioning against both the hunt for role models and the tendency towards defining people by their disability.