Saturday, April 20, 2019

“Neurotribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity” by Steve Silberman


My friend bought this for me to see what my opinion of it was since she knows I read a lot of pop science type books. This one felt different to me though, it feels more like a history book rather than a science one.

Silberman goes through the history of autism and our conception of it, starting with Asperger and continuing through the movie “Rain Man” all the way up to the present day. It’s incredibly detailed, you feel as though you really get to know all of the different players regardless of whether they are clinicians or advocates. He even gets into science fiction and explains how that environment led to modern autism movements!

Throughout the whole book he takes a very gentle tone and doesn’t berate the reader for any misconceptions they may hold regarding autism and the autistic community. He knows that this is probably a learning experience for many readers and guides them to more open and welcoming frames of mind.

I would highly recommend this! It’s very well-written, and so little is known of autism that I think anyone can learn from this.

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