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This is a space to share the words and ideas that have come to you during this project. They might be about the themes of diversity, intersectionality or privilege - or just reflections and thoughts that you want to set free. You can post them anonymously if you like - they will be shared on...

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From Rachel Davison:

'I saw this today on my Facebook feed. I think it provides an interesting insight into the idea of identity and victimology'

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Psychiatry—Labeling Kids with Bogus 'Mental Disorders'

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Psychiatry—Labeling Kids with Bogus 'Mental Disorders'

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From Kay Sidebottom

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CCHRInt: Childhood is Not a Mental Disorder

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http://www.cchrint.org/issues/childmentaldisorders/ 20 Million Kids & Adolescents are labeled with "mental disorders" that are based solely on a checklist of behaviors. There are no brain scans, x-rays, genetic or blood tests that can prove they are "mentally ill", yet these children are stigmatized for life with psychiatric disorders, and prescribed dangerous,life-threatening psychiatric drugs.

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Sweden Just Added A Gender-Neutral Pronoun To Its Dictionary

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Sweden Just Added A Gender-Neutral Pronoun To Its Dictionary

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From Kay Sidebottom

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The official dictionary of the Swedish language, The SAOL, is adding a gender-neutral pronoun to its latest edition, The Guardian reported.

The pronoun, "hen," (pronounced like a female chicken), will join "han" (he) and "hon" (she) as the official gender pronouns of the Swedish language.

"Hen" can be used to refer to a transgender person, a group of people of mixed genders, a person who chooses not to identify with a gender, or when discussing someone whose gender is irrelevant.

"Hen" was coined in the '60s in protest of the use of the male pronoun to describe any group or population that doesn't exclusively contain females. This is the practice in many European languages.

The word didn't become widely used until Sweden's growing transgender community adopted it in the early 2000s. It soon caught on with the rest of the population.

The Guardian reported it's since been used in court rulings, media texts and books, along with other official texts.

"You hear it all the time on TV shows, radio, and magazines, and you don't even think about it anymore," Astrid Öhman, a Swedish resident and recent college graduate, told BuzzFeed News. "I was confused by it when I first heard it a few years ago, but now it's just another word in our dictionary - though with an important purpose, of course."

As well as adding "hen," the dictionary will also remove or add alternatives to words considered racist or otherwise offensive.

The Local reported that the dictionary will remove words like "negerboll" (negro ball), a Swedish sweet, and next to words like "neger," meaning negro, "zigenare," meaning gypsy, and "lapp," which The Local defined as "a derogatory term for an indigenous Sami person from Lappland," the dictionary will recommend alternative words such as "svart," meaning black, and "rom," meaning Roma.

The SAOL dictionary is updated every 10 years. The newest edition will contain 13,000 new words and offensive word alternatives. It will be on sale on April 15.

Ema O'Connor is a politics reporter for BuzzFeed News and is based in Washington, DC.

Contact Ema O'Connor at ema.oconnor@buzzfeed.com.

Got a confidential tip? Submit it here.

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Sweden Just Added A Gender-Neutral Pronoun To Its Dictionary

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"Hen" can be used to refer to a transgender person, a group of people of mixed genders, a person who chooses not to identify with a gender, or when discussing someone whose gender is irrelevant. The Guardian reported it's since been used in court rulings, media texts and books, along with other official texts.

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From Jane Newton:

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From Jane Newton

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Wednesday morning, 9.30am. I am at the London Aquatics Centre in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, a building so vast and light, it makes my eyes hurt. In front of me is the swimming pool, a smooth, blue oblong, where Rebecca Adlington won a bronze medal for the 400m freestyle in 2012 and Ellie Simmonds won two golds. There is nobody in it. Several light years away is a diving pool; behind it, sunlight dazzles. Around the main pool are circular tables. At each table sit six or so schoolgirls aged 14 to 17, and one older woman. It's like a municipal version of a Miami nightclub.

At the far end, where the DJ should be, stands a woman in well-cut trousers and heels. This is Miriam González Durántez, international lawyer, lovely-haired wife of Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg and campaigner. At least, I think it's her: the size of the centre makes it difficult to tell. González Durántez is making a short speech about her organisation, Inspiring Women, the reason we are all here. Unfortunately, the acoustics and her Spanish accent make it hard to understand much of what she's saying.

Inspiring Women is a simple idea: get professional women to talk for one hour to teenage girls about their jobs, so the teenagers hear for themselves about a variety of possible careers. That simplicity, however, comes heavily sprinkled in PR pizzazz. Thus the women will not be just talking, but "speed-mentoring", meaning they're each assigned a table where they chat to the girls (300 in total) for 15 minutes, then move on to talk to another group. They have been collected together in terms of their careers: all the women here except González Durántez have jobs in sport, hence our venue. Clare Balding is hosting alongside González Durántez; everything is being filmed by BT Sport; other Inspiring Women sports-speed-mentoring events are being held simultaneously across the country.

All very exciting, but behind González Durántez and Balding, atop a diving board reached by what seem like the stairs from A Matter Of Life And Death, sits a whopping distraction: teeny tiny Tom Daley. Daley trains in the diving pool every day. Earlier, to oohs and aahs, we watched his dolly frame spin and twirl through the air, then splash into the water. I worry about the feminist implications of one man taking attention away from hundreds of high-achieving women, of Speedos trumping speed-mentoring. But perhaps I'm overanalysing.

Someone rings a bell for the event to start and I walk over to González Durántez's table. She is talking to a group from Caterham High. The girls all have questions, which they read out in turn.

"How do you prepare for your job?" one girl asks, carefully. I'm not sure she knows what González Durántez's job is. González Durántez doesn't mind. She is welcoming, smiling throughout. She explains that she is a lawyer and says she ended up becoming one "by chance".

"It's not whether you are smart," she says, "it's whether you make an effort. I worked hard at school, so I had the discipline to work hard in my job. I know if I put eight hours in, it's better than four hours."

The girls lean in, not because they've read Sheryl Sandberg, but because it's the only way to hear. I check out a few other tables. There is talk of physiotherapy, of sports agents, of presenting, of lobbying organisations. The speakers are sensible, inclusive, goal-oriented; the girls, keen but slightly shy. It is an odd event. The scale of everything - the hugeness of the pool, the height of the ceiling, the number of people, how small everyone is and how far away - messes with your head. Also, although everyone is thoroughly well-meaning, the atmosphere is a bit stiff, and not tailor-made to engage teenagers. After half an hour, some of the girls seem a bit glazed.

Inspiring Women is led by someone who clearly fits the bill herself. From a small village in rural Spain, Miriam González Durántez is now a successful lawyer, a partner specialising in international trade regulations. She's mother to three boys aged six, 10 and 13. She speaks three languages: her native Spanish, plus English and French. Since she launched her initiative last November, she has got 12,000 professional women to talk to 180,000 girls (her aim is to get to 15,000 and 250,000 respectively).

But she is also Nick Clegg's wife. And this means that, unfairly - because that's how power works - her deputy prime minister husband and their relationship are often the bits of her life that get the most attention. No matter how well she does, whichever good causes she supports, González Durántez is still partly regarded as his missus. How galling.

So it's refreshing to see how often she makes teasing statements about her husband's job. She refuses to say that it is more important than him dropping his kids off at school, for instance. "Every single politician would learn more about the state of the country outside the school gates than sitting in hours of meetings," she remarked just the other week. And: "Men want to be with their children... Lots of men are feminists."

She is not a political wife in the old tradition. Not for her the silent sidekick role, gazing supportively at her husband while he does all the talking. This goes for Samantha Cameron and Justine Miliband, too, but they are not quite as high-achieving as González Durántez, and both are more willing to do the media grip-and-grin. They've both stood next to their husbands during party conference speeches (González Durántez remained seated); they've both been in full family portraits with their kids (González Durántez said nope to that, too).

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At William and Kate's wedding in 2011. Photograph: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images

"No, our kids have never been in any pictures with us, never," González Durántez says firmly. "I'm like a tigress when it comes to my children. That is my top priority, and Nick's, too. What I am focusing on right now is how to protect them during the next few months' campaign. Last time, I sent them to Spain, but now they are older, and one has exams."

It's a different day and we are at her place of work, Dechert (pronounced Dekkert), a legal firm in the City. González Durántez and I - plus three of her people and a minder from the Lib Dems (the smartly-suited embodiment of an elephant in the room) - are in a glass-walled meeting space.

González Durántez, a strikingly handsome woman, brings with her a friendly manner, a warmth, but also a sense of urgency. She grips a BlackBerry; she's going to have to take a call at some point.

I've seen González Durántez speak at an awards ceremony where she was charismatic, even mischievous. Today, her charm is tempered by what she wants to get across. "When we do press, Inspiring Women gets a surge in women signing up as mentors," she tells me, and hits me up for contacts for a future event. She is very careful and deliberate with her answers, conscious of how what she says may come back to bite her, or her husband. After all, she is a lawyer married to a politician, and a general election is coming up.

She's more than happy to talk about feminism, and has some sobering figures. For instance, although women make up 49% of the working population in the UK, 75% of them are employed in one of five "C" professions: caring, catering, cashiering, cleaning, clerical. "I do believe very strongly that there is still residual sexism," she says. "A lot of progress has been made - obviously more for some women than for others. But at a general level, I think we have 10%, 15% sexism in the workplace that is holding some women back. And a lot of it translates into lack of self-confidence, which is an issue with girls. With self-confidence, I think, if you don't have it, you have to fake it. But self-confidence is the product of your experience. At the end of the day, the more you do something, the more confident you are."

This is one of the reasons she wants to reach schoolgirls. It's also why she emphasises hard work. We have a small disagreement about this: I say that often it's sparkiness and extroversion that gets you noticed in jobs, rather than silent diligence. González Durántez says maybe, but not at school. "In a school, you have to learn very well a few basic skills, and also to develop your thinking, and work hard. Working very hard doesn't mean you will do only whatever you have been asked to do. No matter where you are, you try a little bit harder."

González Durántez's work ethic is perhaps the reason her campaign has been such a success. She also enjoys it, telling me that it's not only the girls that benefit, but the speakers, too (she thinks that many women are too modest about their achievements). She says that the girls, when asked who they look up to, often say Beyoncé, but just as many say their mum or grandmother ("I want to give them a hug for this").

"It's just about inspiring the girls by the very simple concept of 'I cannot dream it unless I have seen it'," González Durántez says. "We are, I guess, hoping towards the future. Some girls approach you afterwards and say, 'This is fantastic. I am going to try this or that.' But, for many, you are just hoping that you leave a seed. If in the future they think, 'Well, I will want to be an astronaut' and they happen to have met the first female astronaut from the UK... It's a bit of a leap of faith."

It's interesting that she has such a passion for supporting young girls, being the mother of three boys, but she tells me that the boys (Antonio, Alberto and Miguel) have been supportive of her new initiative, giving her ideas, offering help when it comes to making promotional films. "We don't treat our children any different than if they were girls," she says. "I don't have a project of indoctrination for them to be feminists, but I think that you show by example."

González Durántez organises her work around her children: every day, after getting up around 6-6.30am, she or Clegg takes them to school, and she makes sure she can be back for bedtime most evenings. Afterwards, she carries on working: her legal speciality is international trade compliance, so she finds that, due to time differences, this works fine. She learned to bend her job to her needs when she first had a child. She was working in Brussels, in external relations, and friends with Anna Lindh, the Swedish foreign affairs minister (who was later assassinated, in 2003). Lindh told González Durántez to set her own boundaries when it came to her kids, to organise meetings rather than go for dinners.

How do you choose who to have kids with? 'If you feel respected, everything will be fine. And if you don't, think twice'

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'I don't have a project of indoctrination for our children to be feminists, but I think that you show by example.' Photograph: Paul Stuart

I've been told that the Cleggs all speak Spanish at home, but she tells me this isn't true: González Durántez speaks Spanish to the boys, Clegg English, and they speak English to each other. They met in Bruges, in 1991, at a scholarship programme at the College of Europe, in a class on European law and politics. When she first saw him, González Durántez says she thought, "Wow!" (This makes me laugh.) But their first conversations were stilted, as they had to be conducted in their only mutual language, French, which neither spoke brilliantly. They dated for some time before they married and had children.

She has said in the past that choosing the person you have kids with is the biggest decision a woman will ever make. How do you know who to choose, I ask. "Well, you do your homework when you buy a car," she says. "Lots of women feel that it's important to have the discussion [with their partner] as to what you do when you have children. For me, it's much more general than that. It's just to be respected. If you feel respected, everything will be fine. And if you don't, think twice."

She is so sensible, González Durántez, that she can appear sheltered, almost naive. When we talk about role models, she says, "Women who are role models are like mushrooms," and doesn't follow it up with the usual joke about being kept in the dark and fed shit, but with: "The more you look for them, the more you find."

She doesn't seem to have a cynical bone in her body: she really does believe in hard work, respecting others and commitment. "Well, I apply myself to things. I make an effort on everything and I don't do things lightly. If I commit myself to something, I am willing to do it. Also, I am an organised person. I am practical with my clients, I look for solutions. But my weakness is I am impatient. I want results quickly."

González Durántez grew up in Valladolid province, Spain. Both her parents were teachers, though her father, José Antonio González Caviedes, who died in 1996, became better known as a politician - he was mayor of Olmedo for many years. Her mother was the object of some local sympathy. "People felt sorry for her because she had to work," González Durántez says, "but she wanted to. My mother has taught three generations in the village. I am never going to make so much of a difference."

Actually, many of the women González Durántez knew had jobs - they just weren't paid. Both her grandmothers came from rural communities where women laboured in the fields. Her maternal grandmother brought up eight boys (one died) during the Spanish civil war. "She was a tiny, dynamite woman," González Durántez says. "Always vivacious and positive, a lesson in life."

Nick has a demanding job and there are times when it's like, 'Oh my God, how do we handle this?' We work around it'

Though democracy came to Spain after Franco died in 1975, old-fashioned attitudes took a while to wither. At her school, "when boys did sport, girls did knitting. And boys, when they behaved badly, were sent with the girls." González Durántez enjoyed reading and music - she played an hour of piano every day ("I say this to my children, who do half an hour a week!"). As the eldest child of the mayor, she was very much part of village life: "I organised things for the little kids, I helped my father in politics, I tried it all. A race or something, there I was. I wasn't very good at running, but I tried it all."

The village was small: "Three thousand five hundred people - it's like a big family. The gossip in my village makes the Daily Mail pale by comparison." But González Durántez's mother had an outward-looking approach. She sent her daughter to France and to Ireland for extended stays. (In Ireland, her main cross-cultural discovery was "Mars bars: amazing!") Perhaps as a result, her ambitions were wide-ranging. "I wanted to be a doctor, and then the first time I hurt myself and I saw the blood, it was a disaster. Then I wanted to be a writer, I wanted to be a diplomat, I wanted to be a politician." After school, she studied law at the University of Valladolid, got a scholarship to the College of Europe. And then, after she graduated, she tried to get a job.

It was 1992. Spain had just hosted the Olympics in Barcelona. Democracy was established. Optimism was in the air. González Durántez sent her CV to "at least 100 companies", but got not a single reply. She talks about this both to me and to the girls at the sports event. It was clearly an enormous shock to her; she had to move back home to live with her parents.

"I wish somebody had told me that I had to be more realistic. I was part of that generation in Spain that came just after democracy, and there was this feeling that, if you studied, with an education, you could get anything. As a result, we had huge expectations, and it took me some adjustment to come to grips with reality."

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At the Lib Dem conference in 2014. Photograph: Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

She eventually got a job in Brussels at the European Commission, inputting data; and from there she moved up, becoming a leading negotiator for the World Trade Organisation on the subject of telecoms. This seems to me an astonishing career progression, but s

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Miriam González Durántez: 'I'm like a tigress when it comes to my children'

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Wednesday morning, 9.30am. I am at the London Aquatics Centre in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, a building so vast and light, it makes my eyes hurt. In front of me is the swimming pool, a smooth, blue oblong, where Rebecca Adlington won a bronze medal for the 400m freestyle in 2012 and Ellie Simmonds won two golds.

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Teach Different: Identities (with tweets) · KaySocLearn

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Our first Twitter chat about identity in (and out of) the classroom

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By Mandy Ramos

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Sat for most of the morning trying to get to grips with my next session on sociology of childhood, I read and re-read the same thing "what does this mean?" I ask myself how can I pass this informTion on if I can't even get to grips myself!!

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Videoscribe By Cheryl Reynolds

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Nancy Kline's 10 components of thinking environments

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Neurodiversity: Some Basic Terms & Definitions

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Neurodiversity: Some Basic Terms & Definitions

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From Lou Mycroft

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New paradigms often require a bit of new language. This is certainly the case with the neurodiversity paradigm - even the word neurodiversity itself is still relatively new, dating back only to the late 1990s.

I see many people - scholars, journalists, bloggers, internet commenters, and even people who identify as neurodiversity activists - get confused about the terminology around neurodiversity. Their misunderstanding and incorrect usage of certain terms often results in poor and clumsy communication of their message, and propagation of further confusion (including other confused people imitating their errors). At the very least, incorrect use of terminology can make a writer or speaker appear ignorant, or an unreliable source of information, in the eyes of those who do understand the meanings of the terms.

For those of us who seek to propagate and build upon the neurodiversity paradigm - especially those of us who are producing writing on neurodiversity - it's vital that we maintain some basic clarity and consistency of language, for the sake of effective communication among ourselves and with our broader audiences. Clarity of language supports clarity of understanding.

And, as I increasingly find myself in the position of reviewing other people's writing on neurodiversity - grading student papers, reviewing submissions to journals, consulting on various projects, or even just deciding whose writings I'm willing to recommend to people - I'm getting tired of running into the same basic errors over and over.

So, as a public service, I'm posting this list of a few key neurodiversity-related terms, their meanings and proper usage, and the ways in which I most commonly see them mis used.
NEURODIVERSITY What It Means:
Neurodiversity is the diversity of human brains and minds - the infinite variation in neurocognitive functioning within our species.
What It Doesn't Mean:
Neurodiversity is a biological fact. It's not a perspective, an approach, a belief, a political position, or a paradigm. That's the neurodiversity paradigm (see below), not neurodiversity itself.

Neurodiversity is not a political or social activist movement. That's the Neurodiversity Movement (see below), not neurodiversity itself.

Neurodiversity is not a trait that any individual possesses. Diversity is a trait possessed by a group, not an individual. When an individual diverges from the dominant societal standards of "normal" neurocognitive functioning, they don't "have neurodiversity," they're neurodivergent (see below).
Example of Correct Usage: "Our school offers multiple learning strategies to accommodate the neurodiversity of our student body." Examples of Incorrect Usage:
"Neurodiversity claims that..."
This writer is actually trying to talk about either the neurodiversity paradigm or the Neurodiversity Movement. Neurodiversity, as a biological characteristic of the species, can't "claim" anything, any more than variations in human skin pigmentation can "claim" something.

"Neurodiversity is a load of nonsense."
Really? So human brains and minds don't differ from one another? There's an awful lot of scientific evidence that shows quite plainly that there's considerable variation among human brains. And if we all thought alike, the world would be a very different place indeed. The person who wrote this sentence was probably trying to object to the neurodiversity paradigm and/or the positions of the Neurodiversity Movement, and has ended up sounding rather silly as a result of failing to distinguish between these things and the phenomenon of neurodiversity itself.

"My neurodiversity makes it hard for me to cope with school."
The correct word here would be neurodivergence, rather than neurodiversity. Individuals diverge; groups are diverse.
NEURODIVERSITY PARADIGM What It Means:
The neurodiversity paradigm is a specific perspective on neurodiversity - a perspective or approach that boils down to these fundamental principles:

1.) Neurodiversity is a natural and valuable form of human diversity.

2.) The idea that there is one "normal" or "healthy" type of brain or mind, or one "right" style of neurocognitive functioning, is a culturally constructed fiction, no more valid (and no more conducive to a healthy society or to the overall well-being of humanity) than the idea that there is one "normal" or "right" ethnicity, gender, or culture.

3.) The social dynamics that manifest in regard to neurodiversity are similar to the social dynamics that manifest in regard to other forms of human diversity (e.g., diversity of ethnicity, gender, or culture). These dynamics include the dynamics of social power inequalities, and also the dynamics by which diversity, when embraced, acts as a source of creative potential.
What It Doesn't Mean:
The neurodiversity paradigm provides a philosophical foundation for the activism of the Neurodiversity Movement, but the two aren't the same. For instance, there are people working on developing inclusive education strategies based on the neurodiversity paradigm, who don't identify as social justice activists or as part of the Neurodiversity Movement.
Example of Correct Usage: "Those who have embraced the neurodiversity paradigm, and who truly understand it, do not use pathologizing terms like 'disorder' to describe minority neurological variants like autism or bipolarity." NEURODIVERSITY MOVEMENT What It Means:
The Neurodiversity Movement is a social justice movement that seeks civil rights, equality, respect, and full societal inclusion for the neurodivergent.
What It Doesn't Mean:
The Neurodiversity Movement is not a single group or organization, is not run by any single group or organization, and has no leader. Like most civil rights movements, the Neurodiversity Movement is made up of a great many individuals, some of them organized into groups of one sort or another. These individuals and groups are quite diverse in their viewpoints, goals, concerns, political positions, affiliations, methods of activism, and interpretations of the neurodiversity paradigm.

The Neurodiversity Movement began within the Autism Rights Movement, and there is still a great deal of overlap between the two movements. But the Neurodiversity Movement and the Autism Rights Movement are not one and the same. The most significant distinction between the two is that the Neurodiversity Movement seeks to be inclusive of all neurominorities, not just Autistics. Also, there some who advocate for the rights of Autistics but who cannot rightly be considered part of the Neurodiversity Movement because they still consider autism to be a medical pathology or "disorder," a view at odds with the neurodiversity paradigm.
NEURODIVERGENT, or ND (and NEURODIVERGENCE) What It Means:
Neurodivergent, sometimes abbreviated as ND, means having a brain that functions in ways that diverge significantly from the dominant societal standards of "normal."

Neurodivergent is quite a broad term. Neurodivergence (the state of being neurodivergent) can be largely or entirely genetic and innate, or it can be largely or entirely produced by brain-altering experience, or some combination of the two (autism and dyslexia are examples of innate forms of neurodivergence, while alterations in brain functioning caused by such things as trauma, long-term meditation practice, or heavy usage of psychedelic drugs are examples of forms of neurodivergence produced through experience).

A person whose neurocognitive functioning diverges from dominant societal norms in multiple ways - for instance, a person who is Autistic, dyslexic, and epileptic - can be described as multiply neurodivergent.

Some forms of innate or largely innate neurodivergence, like autism, are intrinsic and pervasive factors in an individual's psyche, personality, and fundamental way of relating to the world. The neurodiversity paradigm rejects the pathologizing of such forms of neurodivergence, and the Neurodiversity Movement opposes attempts to get rid of them.

Other forms of neurodivergence, like epilepsy or the effects of traumatic brain injuries, could be removed from an individual without erasing fundamental aspects of the individual's selfhood, and in many cases the individual would be happy to be rid of such forms of neurodivergence. The neurodiversity paradigm does not reject the pathologizing of these forms of neurodivergence, and the Neurodiversity Movement does not object to consensual attempts to cure them (but still most definitely objects to discrimination against people who have them).

Thus, neurodivergence is not intrinsically positive or negative, desirable or undesirable - it all depends on what sort of neurodivergence one is talking about.

The terms neurodivergent and neurodivergence were coined by Kassiane Asasumasu, a multiply neurodivergent neurodiversity activist.
Examples of Correct Usage: "Our school aims to be inclusive of students who are Autistic, dyslexic, or otherwise neurodivergent, though there are some types of neurodivergence that we're still seeking ways to accommodate." "This Facebook group is for people who identify as both queer and ND (neurodivergent)." NEUROTYPICAL, or NT What It Means:
Neurotypical, often abbreviated as NT, means having a style of neurocognitive functioning that falls within the dominant societal standards of "normal."

Neurotypical can be used as either an adjective ("He's neurotypical") or a noun ("He's a neurotypical").

Neurotypical is the opposite of neurodivergent. Neurotypicality is the condition from which neurodivergent people diverge. Neurotypical bears the same sort of relationship to neurodivergent that straight bears to queer.
What It Doesn't Mean:
Neurotypical is not synonymous with non-autistic.

Neurotypical is the opposite of neurodivergent, not the opposite of autistic. Autism is only one of many forms of neurodivergence, so there are many, many people who are neither neurotypical nor autistic. Using neurotypical to mean non-autistic is like using "white" to mean "not black."

Also, neurotypical is not a derogatory word, and has no intrinsic negative connotation. Of course, sometimes people use the word in the context of criticizing the behavior of neurotypicals, but that doesn't make it an intrinsically negative word. A lot of people criticize the behavior of men, too, but that doesn't make "man" an intrinsically derogatory word.
Examples of Correct Usage: "If the primary language of the society in which you were born is well-suited to the purpose of describing your sensory experiences, your needs, and your thought processes, you may have neurotypical privilege." "My sister is NT, but after growing up with an Autistic father and brother, she's quite at ease with other people's neurodivergence." Example of Incorrect Usage:
"Is your daughter Autistic or neurotypical?"
This isn't a well-worded question because there are other possibilities. The daughter in question might be non-autistic, but might also not quality as neurotypical - she might, for instance, be dyslexic or bipolar.
NEUROMINORITY What It Means:
A neurominority is a population of neurodivergent people about whom all of the following are true:

1.) They all share a similar form of neurodivergence.

2.) The form of neurodivergence they share is one of those forms that is largely innate and that is inseparable from who they are, constituting an intrinsic and pervasive factor in their psyches, personalities, and fundamental ways of relating to the world.

3.) The form of neurodivergence they share is one to which the neurotypical majority tends to respond with some degree of prejudice, misunderstanding, discrimination, and/or oppression (often facilitated by classifying that form of neurodivergence as a medical pathology).

Some examples of neurominority groups include Autistic, bipolar, dyslexic, and schizophrenic people.

The word neurominority can function as either a noun ("Autistics are a neurominority") or an adjective ("Autistics are a neurominority group").
NEURODIVERSE What It Means:
A group of people is neurodiverse if one or more members of the group differ substantially from other members, in terms of their neurocognitive functioning.

Or, to phrase it another way, a neurodiverse group is a group in which multiple neurocognitive styles are represented.

Thus, a family, the faculty or student body of a school, the population of a town, or the cast of characters of a TV show would be neurodiverse if some members had different neurocognitive styles from other members - for instance, if some members were neurotypical while others were Autistic.
What It Doesn't Mean:
Many people mistakenly use neurodiverse where the correct word would be neurodivergent.

Of all the terminology errors that people make in writing and speaking about neurodiversity, the incorrect use of neurodiverse to mean neurodivergent is by far the most common.

There is no such thing as a "neurodiverse individual." The correct term is " neurodivergent individual."

An individual can diverge, but an individual cannot be diverse. Diversity is a property of groups, not of individuals. That's intrinsic to the meaning and proper usage of the term diverse. Groups are diverse; individuals diverge.

In addition, neurodiverse does not mean "non-neurotypical." The opposite of neurotypical is neurodivergent, not neurodiverse.

The opposite of neurodiverse would be neurohomogenous (meaning "composed of people who are all neurocognitively similar to one another").

Neurodiverse cannot be used to mean "non-neurotypical," because neurotypical people, like all other human beings, are part of the spectrum of human neurodiversity.

In North America, Europe, and Australia, white people are the racial group that holds the most privilege and societal power. But we do not use the term "racially diverse" to mean "non-white." "Racially diverse" means "including members of multiple racial groups."

To use the term "racially diverse" to mean "non-white," or to describe a Black or Asian-American person, for instance, as a "racially diverse individual," would not merely be an incorrect usage of the word "diverse" - it would also be racist.

It would be racist because it would imply that white people somehow occupy a special, unique position separate from the overall diversity of humanity - "There's us white people, and then there are all those diverse people." Such usage changes the definition of the word "diverse" to mean "not part of the privileged in-group." Again, that's not what the word means, and misusing it in that particular way serves to reinforce a racist mindset in which white people are seen as intrinsically separate from the rest of humanity, rather than as just another part of the spectrum of human diversity.

It is the same with the misuse of the term neurodiverse to mean "non-neurotypical." To describe an Autistic, bipolar, or otherwise neurodivergent person as a "neurodiverse individual" is not merely an incorrect usage of the word "diverse," it's also ableist.

It's ableist because it implies that neurotypical people somehow occupy a special, unique position separate from the overall neurodiversity of humanity. Misusing the word neurodiverse in that particular way serves to reinforce an ableist mindset in which neurotypical people are seen as intrinsically separate from the rest of humanity, rather than as just another part of the spectrum of human neurodiversity.

Humanity is neurodiverse, just as humanity is racially, ethnically, and culturally diverse. By definition, no human being falls outside of the spectrum of human neurodiversity, just as no human being falls outside of the spectrum of human racial, ethnic, and cultural diversity.

In summary, then: misusing the term neurodiverse to mean neurodivergent (i.e., non-neurotypical) is not only plain old bad English, it also subtly reinforces ableism and undercuts the fundamental tenets of the neurodiversity paradigm.

I hope this explanation will help to encourage people (especially people who identify as proponents of the neurodiversity paradigm or supporters of the Neurodiversity Movement) to avoid this problematic misuse of the term neurodiverse in the future, and, when possible, to correct such misuse where they encounter it.
Examples of Correct Usage: "We humans are a neurodiverse species." "We employ a wide variety of creative teaching strategies to accommodate the many different learning styles represented in our highly neurodiverse student body." "My neurodiverse family includes three neurotypicals, two Autistics, and one person who's both bipolar and dyslexic." "I think every single member of their board of directors is neurotypical. An organization that supposedly serves the needs of neurominority children should have a more neurodiverse board." Examples of Incorrect Usage:
"This group welcomes Autistics and other neurodiverse people."
It's nice to be welcomed, but there's no such thing as a "neurodiverse person." the correct phrase here would be "Autistics and other neurodivergent people."

"This group is open to both neurotypicals and the neurodiverse."
No, no, no. "The neurodiverse?" Seriously? What does that even mean? The spectrum of neurodiversity encompasses the entire human species, so one can't label any subset of the human species as "the neurodiverse." And neurotypicals are part of the spectrum of human neurodiversity, so it makes no sense to say "neurotypicals and the neurodiverse," as if those were two separate things. The correct way to say this would be, "This group is open to both neurotypicals and the neurodivergent." Or, one could say something like, "This group is open to all forms of neurodiversity" ("all forms of neurodiversity" would include the neurocognitive styles of all humans, including neurotypicals).
Example of Possibly Correct Usage:
"The students in this classroom are neurodiverse."
This is correct usage if the speaker means that not all of the students in the classroom share the same general style of neurocognitive functioning. However, it is incorrect usage if what the speaker is trying to say is that it's a classroom for students who aren't neurotypical - if that's the case, then once again, the correct term would be neurodivergent instead of neurodiverse.

I hope this list of definitions will help to foster greater clarity and understanding, and more accurate writing, when it comes to the terminology around neurodiversity.

I encourage readers to share this post anywhere it might be useful. If you're writing up submission guidelines for neurodiversity-related writings, for a journal, anthology, conference, or other project, feel free to include a link to this post in your guidelines. If you encounter a journalist who's doing a piece on a neurodiversity-related topic, share this post with them. Share it with college students who are writing about neurodiversity. And please share it in online discussions in which one or more of these terms is being misused or misinterpreted, and in online discussions in which someone says, "Help, I'm new to this stuff and I don't understand what all these terms mean!"

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Neurodiversity: Some Basic Terms & Definitions

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New paradigms often require a bit of new language. This is certainly the case with the neurodiversity paradigm - even the word neurodiversity itself is still relatively new, dating back only to the late 1990s. I see many people - scholars, journalists,

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The Power of Vulnerability (Brené Brown)

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The Power of Vulnerability (Brené Brown)

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From Kay Sidebottom

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Online Courses - Anytime, Anywhere | Udemy

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Udemy is the world's largest destination for online courses. Discover an online course on Udemy.com and start learning a new skill today.

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From Lou Mycroft

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In viewing the First World War through images of the many individuals involved, The Great War in Portraits looks at the radically different roles, experiences, and, ultimately, destinies, of those caught up in the conflict.

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Soundcloud by Cheryl Reynolds

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Sounds from Sunday morning by Cheryl Reynolds 1

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"Head in the direction of change" (Russell Brand)

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"Head in the direction of change" (Russell Brand)

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From Lou Mycroft

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TubeChop allows you to easily chop a funny or interesting section from any YouTube video and share it.

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From Jane Newton

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By Cheryl Reynolds

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Simple overview of Bourdieu's field theory. For a recent paper on the use of a specially-designed "Bourdieu Game" to help students understand this theory, go to http://is.gd/4Eu3Jt

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Everyone is totally just winging it, all the time (Imposter Syndrome)

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Everyone is totally just winging it, all the time (Imposter Syndrome)

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From Kay Sidebottom

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Amid the acrimony surrounding the firing of Jill Abramson, executive editor of the New York Times, there's one point of near-universal consensus: the whole thing was remarkably poorly handled. (Even the Times's publisher, Arthur Sulzberger, seems to agree about that.) Whatever your views of the people involved, it seemed hard to believe: how could an institution as august and smoothly competent as the Times have stumbled so badly?

There were echoes of that same incredulity in Britain this week when Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, revealed in a car-crash of a regional radio interview that he didn't know who he was campaigning for there. Whether you love him, hate him, or hadn't heard of him before reading this blog post, you'd be forgiven for shaking your head. Surely the head of the most popular party in the world's sixth-largest economy has someone to brief him on such basics?

We're similarly shocked whenever authority figures who are supposed to know what they're doing make it plain that they don't, President Obama's healthcare launch being probably the most serious recent example. We shouldn't really be shocked, though. Because all these stories illustrate one of the most fundamental yet still under-appreciated truths of human existence, which is this: everyone is totally just winging it, all the time.

Institutions - from national newspapers to governments and politicial parties - invest an enormous amount of money and effort in denying this truth. The facades they maintain are crucial to their authority, and thus to their legitimacy and continued survival. We need them to appear ultra-competent, too, because we derive much psychological security from the belief that somewhere, in the highest echelons of society, there are some near-infallible adults in charge.

In fact, though, everyone is totally just winging it.

For further evidence, consult this popular Reddit thread, posted on Monday (I found it via Science of Us): "Grown-Ups of Reddit, What is the most embarrassing thing that you should be able to do, but can't?" The short version is that nobody has much of a clue what they're doing:

Basic arithmetic. Really embarrassing at work when I panic and struggle to add up two small numbers :(

I'm nearly 30 years old and don't know how to tie my shoes in the normal fashion. Instead I can only do it bunny ears-style.

Swim, ride a bike, drive a car.

I am really bad at telling time on an analog clock, I know how it works and I can get there but I can't just glance at the clock and know the time.

I've often thought of my experience of adulthood thus far as one of incrementally discovering that there's no institution, or walk of life, in which everybody isn't just winging it. Growing up, I assumed that the newspaper on the breakfast table must be assembled by people who truly knew what they were doing; then I got a job at a newspaper. Unconsciously, I transferred my assumptions of competence to (among others) people who worked in government. Then I got to know a few people who did - and who'd admit, after a pint or two, that their jobs involved staggering from crisis to crisis, concocting credible-sounding policies in cars en route to press conferences, exactly as portrayed in The Thick of It.

And even then I found myself assuming, self-hatingly, that this might be explained by a certain bumbling Britishness, the perverse pride we sometimes take in shambling mediocrity. Then I started working in America. Where, it turns out, everyone is totally just winging it.

This realisation is alarming at first, but it's ultimately deeply reassuring. As the UK organisation Action for Happiness likes to point out, one of the biggest causes of misery is the way we chronically "compare our insides with other people's outsides". We're all mini-New York Timeses or White Houses, energetically projecting an image of calm proficiency, while inside we're improvising in a mad panic. Yet we forget (especially in an era of carefully curated Facebook profiles and suchlike) that everyone else is doing the same thing. The only difference is that they think it's you who's truly competent.

I spent a while trying to think of an ingenious conclusion to this post, so as to give the appearance that I'd been confidently advancing toward it from the start. But on this occasion, more than any other, it would seem appropriate to admit that I failed.

In closing, everyone is totally just winging it.

Topics

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Everyone is totally just winging it, all the time

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Amid the acrimony surrounding the firing of Jill Abramson, executive editor of the New York Times, there's one point of near-universal consensus: the whole thing was remarkably poorly handled. (Even the Times's publisher, Arthur Sulzberger, seems to agree about that.)

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From Cheryl Reynolds

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Storify

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You Tube

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Jill Wilkins - Message for Identities Day 2

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Uploaded by Teach Northern on 2015-05-05.

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Uploaded by Dragon Fruit Films on 2015-03-16.

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Empathy is always more attractive than responsibility.

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Empathy is always more attractive than responsibility.

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From Kay Sidebottom

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tait coles @Totallywired77 - PuNk Learning

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Empathy is always more attractive than responsibility.

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"I sit on a man's back, choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means - except by getting off his...

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In the shadow of white privilege... making the invisible visible

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A case study of the University of Suffolk's handling of racism/discrimination. The title of this presentation stems from the challenges that people of non-Cauc...

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From Kay Sidebottom

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20 mins video

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I come from...

Synapses and neurotransmitters.
Adrenaline and cortisol.

I come from dopamine.

My brain fizzes on 24 channels.
My limbs twitch.
My heart flutters.

I come from rage.

Damaged but not broken.
Sweary, fiery, fierce.
Loyal and loving.

The best parent.

I come from a bad start.

I come from ADD.

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Am
I drowning in a ‘culture of scarcity’?

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Am
I drowning in a ‘culture of scarcity’?

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Janet Ryalls

I’m off work again, feeling low,

depressed, and anxious and feeling ashamed because someone else will have to pick up my work, knowing they too will be overloaded with work.

Why then am I off work feeling like I do and my colleagues keep going?

Yes, comparison is dangerous but I still ask the question.

I know I will be told I lack resilience.

It seems I have enough problems, for example,

Never good enough

Never perfect enough

Never thin enough

Never powerful enough

Never smart enough

Never certain enough

Never safe enough

Never extraordinary enough

So why am I struggling with shame and worthlessness, where is this coming from?

I know others will be pulling me down, making me feel a failure because I am not a part of the success ethos.

I am human and I have now reached the knowing of enough, as Brown writes, “that I am enough”.

I do feel vulnerable exposing my weakness and insecurities to myself and others.

I can state categorically I am not perfect, I am not better than others and I do have limitations.

So what do I say to those who live the “culture of scarcity”?

Well in the words of Clark Gable, “quite frankly dear, I don’t give a damn”.

I AM ENOUGH!!!!

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From Rob McPherson

My Identity
I was forged in the city of steel, near the Crucible in the valley of the Don, from Scottish grit and Derbyshire’s rolling hills.

I grew up on the front line where S3 meets S4, where I was the minority, but it didn’t matter.
It didn’t matter because round here we are all colour blind.
Round here it’s your actions not the colour of your skin, religion or race that matters.

They tell me its grim up north, but I say we, grin, smile and laugh… I’m proud and passionate about living in the world’s largest village.

Here we call each other love, mate and pal.
Where on my walk to work I will be greeted by people I don’t know with a Hi or How-do.

My roots lay deep in working class engineering, the unions and the wards of the NHS,
Roots where you left a factory on Friday and started at the one across the road on Monday because they paid more.
Roots that were destroyed by Maggie’s iron rule.

I have made mistakes, some that have cut deep.
I use them as my motivation to be better and to try harder for me and my family.

I found my wings at 13, fuelled by a childhood passion and I learnt to soar,
But I didn’t leave this country until I was twenty six. Now I regret leaving it so long.

I shoot lions, tigers and sharks, through a five hundred mil lens with a Nikon Badge.
I see life in still frames, surrounded in the mathematics of apertures, shutter speeds and ISO’s

I am inspired by the people around me, through acts of kindness, bravery and resilience.
I aspire to be like them, to make a positive difference to someone else’s life.

I am a hopeless romantic, who cries too much, mostly in private.
I am moved by lyrics and movie scenes.

I am a worrier who lacks self-confidence, who hides it with sarcasm and humour.
I DO care, even when I pretend I don’t.

I am a son, husband, father and best friend. My family are my world, they are my reason for getting up in the morning and burning the midnight oil.
I never knew how much I wanted to be a dad until my daughter arrived in my life.

I believe in god, you can call me a Christian. I believe it is better to believe in anything than in nothing at all.
I find strength and solace in my belief, but it is something I rarely talk openly about.

I have seen illness ravage some of the most important and influential people to wander through my life, turning people into silhouettes of themselves or worse, taking them from us far too soon.
It keeps me focused on making the most of everyday, because I could be next.

I am an educator, but I learn something new every day.
I fear I learn more from my students than they do from me.
I value my education from the establishment and from life.
I am not big headed enough to think I know it all, even if I’d like to think so.

I am stubborn, hot headed, impulsive and irrational.
The smallest things can consume me, whilst the big things pass me by.

I am full of insecurities about my appearance, ability and my future.
I am scared I’m not good enough and that I will let others down.
It is the kindness of others and my belief that I use as a crutch to make sure I carry on.

My creative mind sometimes clouds my judgement, it leads me off at tangents which miss the point.
It can also take me places I could never have dreamed of and offer life changing experiences.

I am not what you think I am,
I am all of the above and more.
I am complicated and do not fit into the pigeon holes of stereotypes.
I am not simple, my identity changes daily, depending on my company and mood.
All I can tell you is to take some time to speak with me,
Listen to me and decide for yourself who I am.

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Who am I?

Lots of things

All mixed up

A bit of a toad and a bit of a twat

A bit Avellino, Leicester, Manchester & Dublin

Belong neither here nor there, an outsider

A bit jazz 'n' blues

Guitary

Bikey

Loads of rotten running shoes

A torn rotator cuff

Love love stories

Full of fear

Dilettante

Immigrant born in Leicester

Socialist

I Care

I Share

I come from my mum, a Gallo

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Katy

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Claire Kelly

I come from…

Irish, southern and Yorkshire roots

I come from…

Council houses, broken homes, single mums

Struggles andWorries

I come from…

Fleeting visits, pubs, cheese and

onion crisps and lemonade

I come from…

M25, long car journeys and southern holidays with pebble beaches

I come from…

Greenhouses, tomato plants and the smell of oil

I come from…

Strong women and a kind hearted man

I come from…

I come from…

I come from…

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Colour

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Color me confused about most things, generally. So to better understand one thing in particular (gender identity), I'll use something almost everyone loves: Crayola crayons. By assigning different colors to different genders, it's a bit easier to visualize some identities, and a bit easier to understand gender.

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Ronnie Smith

I heard “I come from......You?”

I come from short, Welsh, fiery, beautiful, “Rosie” by name, a rose to behold.

Cardigan girls’ boarding school, lady in the making but once ran away with the gypsies.

Fled her Knightsbridge privilege to cycle in the north, mending broken miners, delivering their daughters.

Met striving Irish, ambitious, adoring engineer. Ten years her junior, love ignited in Wakefield.

Two dutiful daughters, homebound, lovers lost in Flanders mud.

But later, a gift, a boy! “Sonny”, swimming, strong, handsome, hard-working, violent temper, bearer of all family hope & dreams – daddy.

Fruition with bonny, shy, should-have-been-a-teacher, no money for grammar school uniform, sweet, kindness in a body - mummy.  Eighth survivor of ten offsprung from diminutive, devoted, bog-peasant Irish. Tears in readiness, mediators of others’ pain, givers of love.

Wage-slave, self-educated suppliers of soup from their own humble 30’s kitchen. Worn down by Rotherham furnace lungs.

A clash of two worlds, politics, perspectives.

See down to a deeper vein of Celtic artistic creativity, serving others, honour and nobility in true worth, not possessions.

I come from..... the hopes and dreams of the nameless forerunners into my last of four, treasured, snowdrop, different girl-role.

I come from delicious Huddersfield “watter”, Yorkshire millstone grit.

I come from music, poetry, tears, laughter, loving daughter, sister, mother, friend, worker, teaching, nursing, running away to my own gypsies, running headlong towards my own demons. Surviving. SURVIVOR.

I come from privilege and poverty, conflict and calm, learning and ignorance..... and on I go, dancing.

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Identities
Is an exciting new CPD programme funded by the Skills Funding Agency and Equality Challenge Unit. This project aims to change the way that teachers and students talk about equality, diversity, privilege and the intersection of different identities - vital and important work that is rarely seen in the sector.
I come from...
Capturing
Language with
Wordles
TeachDifferent: Identities
Irish, southern and Yorkshire roots
I come from...
Council houses, broken homes, single mums
Struggles and worries
I come from...
Fleeting visits, pubs, cheese and
onion crisps and lemonade
I come from...
M25, long car
journeys and southern holidays with pebble beaches
I come from...
Greenhouses,
tomato plants and the smell of oil
I come from...
Strong women and a kind-hearted man
I come from...
I come from...
I come from...
I come from...
I come from...

Synapses and neurotransmitters.
Adrenaline and cortisol.

I come from dopamine.

My brain fizzes on 24 channels.
My limbs twitch.
My heart flutters.

I come from rage.

Damaged but not broken.
Sweary, fiery, fierce.
Loyal and loving.

The best parent.

I come from a bad start.

I come from ADD.
Tramadol
I come from...
'The process... two workshops where we explored personal identities, examined the language we use in our teaching, talked about how we currently embed equality and diversity...and discovered the limitations of our practice.
The outputs... creation of media pieces which shared our journeys and discoveries. Poems, art, videos, photos...
Supported by individual coaching.

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Skills Funding Agency and Equality Challenge Unit

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Identities Is an exciting new CPD programme funded by the Skills Funding Agency and Equality Challenge Unit.