(Due to some extenuating personal circumstances, I wasn’t able to complete the final in its entirety even with an extension from Dr. Foss, but I wanted to post what I was able to complete.)
Alex Huber
Professor Foss
ENG384
Dec 9 2021
Final Project
Published in 2018, Julia Miele Rodas’s Autistic Disturbances is a deconstruction of the prevalent idea that autism impairs a person’s ability to communicate, arguing that autism and autistic language are inherently valuable to mainstream literature and popular culture. In Rodas’s introduction, she outlines her approach to autistic language and autistic voices, which she tackles from a literary and cultural angle. Rodas argues that, unlike with allistic people, autistic people’s expressions and language are often pathologized and treated as less valuable than allistic people’s. Despite this pathologizing, however, Rodas argues that autistic language has many similarities to pieces of literature that are considered culturally valuable, such as the works of Charlotte Brontë, Walt Whitman, and many others. At its heart, Autistic Disturbances is an analysis of the language around autistic voices and expression.
Word Count = 132
I hereby declare upon my word of honor that I have neither given nor received unauthorized help on this work. Alex Huber.