Autism and the Culture of Therapy
Autism and the Culture of Therapy
The Politics and Practice of Applied Behaviour Analysis
Autism and the Culture of Therapy is the first empirical study of the highly controversial field of applied behavioural therapies. Julia Gruson-Wood finds that despite the proscriptive, programmatic nature of the underlying behavioural science, behaviour therapies have become the standard of autism care because of how adaptable and flexible they are. They are embodied not simply within managerial or clinical attempts at standardization and regulation, but through multiple interpretations, ethical frameworks, and creative applications by diverse practitioners. Thus, to understand behaviour therapies, we need to assess them not as science, but by how they are applied in everyday practice. Doing so shows how the complexity of larger economic, institutional, and political forces results in their deeply variable application.
Drawing on two years of ethnographic research in Ontario, Autism and the Culture of Therapy examines how applied behaviour checklists, forms, protocols, and plans shape professional consciousness, how managerial governance strategically appropriates clinical data, how the rise of para-practitioners democratizes science, and how gender, sexuality, and identity politics imbue clinical practice and social responses to autism.
This important study reveals the fascinating and complex workplace culture of therapy providers to tell the story of a clinical field that has risen along with rates of autism diagnosis, and redefined what autism means.
A must-read for those in disability studies, sociology, medical anthropology, and psychology, this thorough and practical work will also be of interest to autism therapy practitioners, members of the autistic community, disability activists, and parents and families of autistic children.
I will use Autism and the Culture of Therapy in my roles as an academic, activist, as a family member, and as someone who once worked in the service-providing industry for people with intellectual and developmental disability. This impeccable work of scholarship fills a vital gap in the literatures and is important across many fields.
I cannot emphasize enough the import and urgency of this book. Autism and the Culture of Therapy is a ground-breaking study, expertly revealing the material, embodied stakes in autism therapy today and laying the groundwork for more expansive and justice-oriented approaches.
Julia Gruson-Wood is a research partnership officer at the University of Toronto, Scarborough, and an adjunct faculty member in the Social Practice and Transformational Change program at the University of Guelph. Her work has appeared in such publications as the Canadian Journal of Public Health, the International Journal of Disability and Social Justice, the International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, and the Journal of Homosexuality.
Law and Neurodiversity
Youth with Autism and the Juvenile Justice Systems in Canada and the United States
By Dana Lee Baker, Laurie A. Drapela, and Whitney Littlefield
