See It Feelingly : Classic Novels, Autistic Readers, and the Schooling of a No-Good English Professor
“We each have Skype accounts and use them to discuss [Moby-Dick] face to face. Once a week, we spread the worded whale out in front of us; we dissect its head, eyes, and bones, careful not to hurt or kill it. The Professor and I are not whale hunters. We are not letting the whale die. We are shaping...
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Duke University Press Books
2018
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| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=1887624&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: nlebk uiTerm: 1887624 longDbName: eBook Collection (EBSCOhost) uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: btl: See It Feelingly : Classic Novels, Autistic Readers, and the Schooling of a No-Good English Professor aug: au: Ralph James Savarese sertl: Thought in the Act isbn: 9781478001300 9781478002734 9781478093473 imageinfo: pubinfo: dt: @attributes: year: 2018 month: 01 day: 01 dtAvail: @attributes: year: 2018 month: 09 day: 17 pub: Duke University Press Books pubContract: Duke University Press place: Durham price: 0.01 limitsGroup: maxCheckoutDays: 1500 pda: N printPagesOffline: 100 printPagesOnline: 100 previewPages: 10000 prePubGroup: dewey: @attributes: class: 616.85882 item: 616 .85882 lc: @attributes: class: RC553.A88 item: RC 553 .A88 artinfo: ui: 1887624 1026231464 formats: fmt: @attributes: type: EB doid: NL$1887624$PDF caption: PDF download: Y tig: atl: See It Feelingly : Classic Novels, Autistic Readers, and the Schooling of a No-Good English Professor ptl: See It Feelingly aug: au: Ralph James Savarese su: English fiction--Study and teaching Language and languages Autistic people--Education Autistic people--Psychology Autistic people--Language sug: subj: LITERARY CRITICISM / American / General EDUCATION / Essays SOCIAL SCIENCE / Disability English fiction--Study and teaching Language and languages Autistic people--Education Autistic people--Psychology Autistic people--Language ab: “We each have Skype accounts and use them to discuss [Moby-Dick] face to face. Once a week, we spread the worded whale out in front of us; we dissect its head, eyes, and bones, careful not to hurt or kill it. The Professor and I are not whale hunters. We are not letting the whale die. We are shaping it, letting it swim through the Web with a new and polished look.”—Tito MukhopadhyaySince the 1940s researchers have been repeating claims about autistic people's limited ability to understand language, to partake in imaginative play, and to generate the complex theory of mind necessary to appreciate literature. In See It Feelingly Ralph James Savarese, an English professor whose son is one of the first nonspeaking autistics to graduate from college, challenges this view.Discussing fictional works over a period of years with readers from across the autism spectrum, Savarese was stunned by the readers'ability to expand his understanding of texts he knew intimately. Their startling insights emerged not only from the way their different bodies and brains lined up with a story but also from their experiences of stigma and exclusion.For Mukhopadhyay Moby-Dick is an allegory of revenge against autism, the frantic quest for a cure. The white whale represents the autist's baffling, because wordless, immersion in the sensory. Computer programmer and cyberpunk author Dora Raymaker skewers the empathetic failings of the bounty hunters in Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Autistics, some studies suggest, offer instruction in embracing the nonhuman. Encountering a short story about a lonely marine biologist in Antarctica, Temple Grandin remembers her past with an uncharacteristic emotional intensity, and she reminds the reader of the myriad ways in which people can relate to fiction. Why must there be a norm?Mixing memoir with current research in autism and cognitive literary studies, Savarese celebrates how literature springs to life through the contrasting responses of unique individuals, while helping people both on and off the spectrum to engage more richly with the world. pubtype: eBook doctype: Book ougenre: Book language: English copyright: @attributes: flag: N copyrightText: holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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