2014 ASDay and AWN PoC Book

Hi all! 

I know I have a few submissions from 2013 I need to post.  Sorry for the delay, I got delayed for too long.  But I am going to post them.  Just as soon as I finish this post.  

I'm getting ready for ASDay 2014.  It's on a Saturday this year, and I wanted to let people prepare in advance, to think about what they're going to do.  

At the same time, there is something I think that is important that may or may not appeal to participants.  But this is really important, important enough that I'm posting this on here and on No Stereotypes Here.  I know that ASDay matters to a lot of you because it gathers many voices in a large event, as well as other reasons, but I'd like to take the opportunity to address another opportunity coming up soon that people may want to concentrate working on. 

I'm going to have to disclose, of course, as I am Vice-President of the Autism Women's Network.  But AWN is working to publish an anthology on Autism and Race, and is looking for submissions, due November 14, 2014.  If you are autistic, and a person of colour, racialized, or non-white, I encourage you to look at the AWN submission guide and consider submitting something. 

This is a project lead by Lydia Brown, aka Autistic Hoya, who I don't know about you, but is one of the people I'd immediately ask "how much do you want me to write, and when do you want it?" if not go scrambling to look for something I've already written.  

But this is your choice.  I understand either way.  

What matters is you expressing yourself, your story, what you want to say about yourself as an autistic person and your life, what you want to tell other people, what you want to change about the world.  This is about you communicating and gaining power through that, about providing an outlet, a starting point.  

ASDay has been described as a blogging carnival, a festival of our "voices", our passions and dreams. It is a celebration of who we are, a memorial of our scars, a scream of our struggles, a rallying cry to continue on for our rights. Because of the most powerful words "I am not alone". 

Intersectionality is how different aspects of our identities affect our experiences, sometimes in different ways in different situations.  Like being a woman can be a privilege in one situation, or be a barrier in another, or being a person of colour, or being disabled, rich or poor, and so on. 

The anthology matters because for too long has books and Autism materials about us been dominated by parents, professionals, and white people who do not represent all experiences of autistic people.  I see it every time I walk into an Autism conference center and look at the book displays.  How can we be "Nothing About Us, Without Us" without all of us being published, without all of us being represented?

 It cannot happen. 

Not without projects like the Autism and Race anthology.  

Either way, I look forward to seeing your work!!