Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Autism, Sexuality, And Bdsm, Ariel E. Pliskin

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

This paper will explore the following areas in which idiosyncratic, sensitive and intense autistic ways of being result in patterns of sexual behavior and reasons autistic people may be particularly drawn to BDSM: 1) autistic sensorimotor intensity promotes non-normative movement, including sadomasochistic, patterns of movement 2) the autistic preference for literal and concrete language matches the BDSM culture’s norms of explicit verbal consent 3) idiosyncratic autistic attention fits will with opportunities within BDSM for developing a long-term career of learning and deep engagement. 4) the double empathy problem results in marginalization of autistic people from mainstream society while BDSM communities …

Listening To Neurodiverse Voices In The Workplace, Lewis Burton, Vicki Carss, Ricardo Twumasi

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

Neurodivergent individuals face many challenges in the workplace, job application process, recruitment process and in the work environment. This qualitative study aimed to gain insight into the experiences of neurodivergent individuals and some of the barriers faced in these domains at work. Twenty-one neurodivergent individuals took part in semi-structured interviews. Interpretative phenomenological analysis was used to give voice to interviewees first-person lived experience. Six superordinate themes were highlighted in this study: ‘External Perceptions of Neurodiversity’, ‘Identity Degradation”, ‘Self-Identity’, ‘Organisational Obstacles’, ‘Neurodiversity Empowerment’, and ‘Language Regarding Neurodiversity’. This study found that neurodivergent individuals are impacted by the inaccurate stereotypes and assumptions …

The Fable Of Neuroplastic Lyra, Ricardo Twumasi

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

This paper tells a folktale of two tribes and the neurodivergence that brought them together, through language and the patterns of the sounds that surrounded the tribes.

Acknowledgements:

Thank you to Alex Higson for editing an early version of this article. Thanks to Maximin Lange, Lewis Burton, Juliet Foster, Sukhi Shergill and Oliver Runswick for your comments.