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The path toward a neurocosmopolitan perspective––on either an individual or collective scale––necessarily involves learning to recognize our internalized standards of neuronormativity as culturally constructed and culturally instilled, and then freeing our minds from the limits of those standards. Another crucial step is to produce more and more literature, art, educational material, and entertainment that decenters the neurotypical perspective and the neurotypical gaze––in other words, work which not only is grounded in non-neuronormative perspectives, but also refuses to assume that the default reader or viewer is neurotypical. By being aware of your neurodivergent identity and your queer identity, and recognizing that they interact, you have successfully neuroqueered. Considering how your other identities, such as race, socioeconomic class, ethnicity, ect., interact with your neurodivergence and your queerness is also neuroqueering.
The pathology paradigm starts from the assumption that significant divergences from dominant sociocultural norms of cognition and embodiment represent some form of deficit, defect, or pathology. In other words, the pathology paradigm divides the spectrum of human cognitive/embodied performance into “normal” and “other than normal,” with “normal” implicitly privileged as the superior and desirable state. National Professional Qualification of Middle Leadership, Institute of Education (UCL), 2016 (part-time).
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The emergence and popularisation of Neuroqueer theory in the contemporary disability rights discourse and Autistic rights movement represents a significant step forward. Not only does it encourage pride in ones true self, but it emancipates the Neurologically Queer from the normative attitudes that society so often indoctrinates us into. For many people this term may be new, so in this article we will explore it’s origins and meaning. Shannon, D. B. (2022). Perversity, precarity, and an embarrassment of (neuro)queer failures: Tracing a ‘more precise typology’ of the affects of failure and anxiety in an in-school research-creation project. International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education. ( Open Access) From the Houses of the Kiki Ballroom Scene, to the sisterhood forged in Lesbian Bars, Queers have experience creating home and family in a world not built for us.
Shannon, D. B. (2019). ‘What could be feminist about sound studies?’: (in)Audibility in young children’s soundwalking. Journal of Public Pedagogies. (4) (Open Access)Truman, S. E. and Shannon, D. B. (August 2018). Queer sonic cultures: An affective walking-composing project. Capacious: Affective Inquiry/Making Space. Lancaster, Pennsylvania. As a bi autistic cis man, I find this term profoundly moving. At the same time, I also feel I’m not “queer” enough to neuroqueer and that makes me sad. I relate to queering as a political act but I feel like I’m unable to integrate my neurodivergence into it because I feel kind of unseen by portions of the autistic community who are on the vanguard (as someone who was diagnosed young, had a lot of interventions and was diagnosed with terminology that is now broadly rejected by other autistic people). I also would love to see more people neuroqueering sexuality specifically. I commend and celebrate my neurodivergent fam who are queering gender in transformative ways. While I’ve questioned my gender occasionally, I feel that the majority of my reflection on neurodivergence and my queerness are centered around my orientation, NT assumptions about ND gender and (presumed a)sexuality have been used to erase my love for men as a man, for example. In addition to being thoroughly neuroqueer, these fabulous books are also gripping space opera tales grounded in the best classic sci-fi traditions. Hoffmann has also produced a lot of extraordinarily good and thoroughly neuroqueer short stories and poetry, much of which can be found in the collection Monsters in My Mind. Two authors who stand out for me as being on the leading edge of the emerging field of neuroqueer speculative fiction are Dora M. Raymaker and Ada Hoffmann. Dr. Raymaker: Are there any people right now who you feel are taking neurodiversity scholarship to this next level, or bringing it into the future in interesting or innovative new ways? What are they bringing to the discourse?
Dora M. Raymaker’s published fiction so far includes the brilliant sci-fi detective novel Hoshi and the Red City Circuit, the short story “Heat Producing Entities” (which appears in Volume 3 of the annual Spoon Knife neuroqueer lit anthology), and the epic novel Resonance, which will be published sometime in 2022 (I’ve already read Resonance because I had the honor of being Raymaker’s editor on it, and I’m eager for everyone else to read it).
Shannon, D.B. ' Perversity, precarity, and anxiety: tracing a ‘more precise typology’ of the affect of neuroqueer failure in an in-school research-creation project.' International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, pp. 1-15. Shannon, D.B. (2020) ' Neuroqueer(ing) Noise: Beyond ‘Mere Inclusion’ in a Neurodiverse Early Childhood Classroom.' Canadian Journal of Disability Studies, 9(5) pp. 489-514. Dr. Walker: Whatever else it might look like, any future society that has embraced and been transformed by the neurodiversity paradigm would be distinguished by two fundamental qualities: it would be neurocosmopolitan and it would be neuroqueer. Shannon, D. B. (August 2018). Affect and Neuro-diverse learning in the Early Years: Sound-art as relational pedagogy. Capacious:Affective Inquiry/Making Space. Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
And then you look at M. Remi Yergeau’s work, and it’s full of all these fresh mind-bending insights, because Yergeau’s approach to the topic of neurodiversity is based in the field of rhetoric––and that’s a whole other lens that reveals entirely new potentials of the topic. NeuroQueer.org is an online platform community, a place to get queer-competent ADHD Coaching and/or Autism support from peers and coaches. We can build accomodations for the obstacles and challenges of being neurodivergent, and embrace the benefits simultaneously. We don't have to do it alone. Another term you use a lot is “neurocosmopolitan” or “neurocosmopolitanism.” Where does Neuroqueer Theory fit into a neurocosmopolitan world? 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.
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If someone is neurodivergent (for example, ADHDers) but does not identify as queer, can they, too, practice neuroqueering? For those of us who seek to propagate and build upon the neurodiversity paradigm – especially those of us who are producing writing on neurodiversity – it’s vital that we maintain some basic clarity and consistency of language, for the sake of effective communication among ourselves and with our broader audiences. Clarity of language supports clarity of understanding. Just as a cosmopolitan perspective recognizes that there’s no “normal,” “superior,” or “default” culture or ethnicity, a neurocosmopolitan perspective––or a neurocosmopolitan society––is one in which no sort of mind is privileged as “normal,” or as superior to others, or as the natural default way for a mind to be. queer as not about who you’re having sex with, that can be a dimension of it, but queer as being about the self that is at odds with everything around it and has to invent and create and find a place to speak and to thrive and to live.” bell hooks
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