On the one hand, conceiving of Neurodivergence as a Queering of the social world is actually quite interesting. The analogy seems to check out, but I think it leads us into troubled waters, which I will get to later. Nevertheless, there is room for theoretically deep investigation here.
It seems sort of obvious to me that Queerness is a Neurodivergence in some capacity, especially as defined by this article's definition which is a bit more lax than I would've liked. But here's the trouble: any deviance from an imagined norm might then be considered neurodivergence under this criterion. And a given norm is always fictitious. Everyone is a bit divergent in some capacity by definition. So, then, what is the use of a concept like neurodivergence? Some scholars have made this point in earnest, such as Sam Timimi, who argues that neurodivergence as a concept is useless for precisely this reason, but for the purposes of this article, making such a claim seems like throwing the baby out with the bathwater, especially if our goal is to better understand neurodivergence rather than deconstruct it.
The opposite danger seems to be approached by claiming that neurodivergence is a queering of the social world. If neurodivergence is a queering of the social world, and gender/sex are part of the social world, it then appears like queerness should then be understood as a species of neurodivergence, just that species of ND which deals with gender/sex. We once again run into the problem of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Just some food for thought. Don't take this comment as antagonistic, but in the good faith in which it was intended.
I have some mixed thoughts about this piece.
On the one hand, conceiving of Neurodivergence as a Queering of the social world is actually quite interesting. The analogy seems to check out, but I think it leads us into troubled waters, which I will get to later. Nevertheless, there is room for theoretically deep investigation here.
It seems sort of obvious to me that Queerness is a Neurodivergence in some capacity, especially as defined by this article's definition which is a bit more lax than I would've liked. But here's the trouble: any deviance from an imagined norm might then be considered neurodivergence under this criterion. And a given norm is always fictitious. Everyone is a bit divergent in some capacity by definition. So, then, what is the use of a concept like neurodivergence? Some scholars have made this point in earnest, such as Sam Timimi, who argues that neurodivergence as a concept is useless for precisely this reason, but for the purposes of this article, making such a claim seems like throwing the baby out with the bathwater, especially if our goal is to better understand neurodivergence rather than deconstruct it.
The opposite danger seems to be approached by claiming that neurodivergence is a queering of the social world. If neurodivergence is a queering of the social world, and gender/sex are part of the social world, it then appears like queerness should then be understood as a species of neurodivergence, just that species of ND which deals with gender/sex. We once again run into the problem of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
Just some food for thought. Don't take this comment as antagonistic, but in the good faith in which it was intended.