Constructing autism: autistic adults in conversation

This article attends to the construction of autism during conversations with and between adults diagnosed as autistic in adulthood. Led by a researcher collective of eleven adults belonging to a post-diagnostic support group, and two university-based academics, this paper offers interpretative and theoretical insight into the constructions of autism as neurological difference, identity, and disability, and into the positioning of diagnosis as a route to liberation, resistance and collectivisation. In exploring the possibility and limitation in these constructions and positions, we draw upon M.Remi Yergeau’s work on neurological queerness (2018). Yergeau’s theorisation offers an exciting view of the defiance that autistic being and queering present to the normative social order; and thus helps to articulate the import of the nuanced experiences and positions the autistic researchers shared as part of this research. We conclude by emphasising the value of autistic-led, participatory qualitative research as momentum for anti-ablist practice and critical scholarship.