Trento, Francisco B.: Neuroqueer invention as a framework for dis(abling) arts education
This presentation proposes methodological constraints to open arts-education to neuroqueerness, explicitly drawing on the concept of “invention”, as it is taken by the autistic Critical Disability Studies scholar Melanie Yergeau (2018). Neuroqueering is “a generous and interbodily gesturing (…) beyond brains, bones, and dermis; one that waves in a plurality of identities, orientations, affective stances, and lived experiences, modes ranging from autism to deafness to trauma to asexuality” (Yergeau, 2018). Melanie Yergeau employs Garrett et al.’s concept of invention to express the ever-inventing becoming of the neuroqueer socialities: “making connections, rearranging materials (words, images, concepts) in unexpected ways.” I will argue for the dislodging of neuroqueer traits from the realm of pathologising, by understanding them as inventive modes of being that defy the normalisation of bodies and academic institutions. When fully recognised, inventive neurodiverse perception can potentially disrupt the lack of inclusiveness in arts education institutions and their curriculums.
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