Edited by Biklen, with chapters written by Richard Attfield, Larry Bissonnette, Lucy Blackman, Jamie Burke, Alberto Frugone, Tito Rajarshi Mukhopadhyay, and Sue Rubin, this book challenges the prevailing, tragic narrative of impairment that so often characterizes discussions about autism. “A basic premise of the book is that people classified as autistic, even those who cannot speak, are thinking people with ideas about their lives and their relationship to the world. I call this orientation the presumption of competence” (p. 1).

 

Lucy Blackman was at one time thought moderately retarded (actually in Australia the term applied was intellectually disabled). She learned to communicate using facilitated communication and has since graduated to being able to type without physical support. She earned a bachelor’s degree in arts and letters from Deakin University in Australia and is currently enrolled in graduate studies. Anthony Attwood says of Blackman’s book in his introduction: “Lucy provides the point of view of someone with autism who has never used speech. I first met Lucy in Melbourne in 1990 and over the intervening years she has taught me more about autism than any academic text” (p. vii).

 

An autobiographical account of Anne McDonald’s struggle to leave a mental retardation institution. McDonald, who learned to communicate via facilitation, had to pass several validation tests before being declared competent and permitted to leave the institution. “Unless someone makes a jump by going outside the handicapped person’s previous stage of communication, there is no way the speechless person can do so. Failure is no crime. Failure to give someone the benefit of the doubt is” (p. 76).

 

Charles Hale, a man with autism, discovered the communication technique of facilitated communication (FC) when he was 36 years old, and this book chronicles his life before and after he began to use FC through both Charles’ and his mother’s narratives. When he was a child, Hale was diagnosed as “trainably mentally retarded,” and it was not until he began using FC that he discovered he was autistic. While some of Charles’ narrative has been edited for easier reading, the authors make a conscious choice to leave many of Charles’ passages as originally typed, so that reader can see the clear intended meaning through errors made while using the method. The narrative provides, in Charles’ voice, a fascinating and detailed insiders’ perspective to what autism feels like, how Charles’ apraxia and dyspraxia have affected his life and his communication, and how FC allows Charles not to emerge from autism, but rather, to express himself “as the intelligent, cognizant man he really is.”   

 

Mukhopadhyay, an adolescent with autism whose mother taught him to read and write, lets us into his everyday life.

 

“Eloquent. Philosophical. Introspective. These are not the words usually associated with an autistic child. But in a remarkable display of courage and creativity, a boy named Tito has shattered stereotypes, and in The Mind Tree makes us question all of our previous assumptions about autism. For Tito is severely autistic and nearly nonverbal, and this is his story” (www.amazon.com).

 

An autobiographical account by a young man with autism who learned to communication with physical support and who now types independently and can speak. Lorna Wing has written in the forward to this book: “His writing provides a vivid description of what it is like to be autistic and his thoughts about the meaning of life. It is essential reading for anyone wanting to understand the nature of autism” (p. 3).

 

A best-selling autobiographical novel by a writer with cerebral palsy, including a brief description of his writing method that includes facilitation.

 

An autobiographical account of one person’s learning to communicate via facilitation. Exceptionally rich material on how one person experiences autism.