Tuesday, October 30, 2012

This is my last Blog

This is my last Blog.

The system no longer works, it is practically impossible to comment on blogs due to Capcha's because they don't work, I know I typed a response correctly but it still wouldn't let me in. The technology is unreliable, totally broken, and other than that people are migrating from the blog world in droves.

No I am going back to the original concept of my web site. I shall over time be reforming that and all I shall post hereafter are links to it.

This blog will remain as historical material  until Google finally pulls the plugs (which I expect they will eventually)

Autism Hub, Autismo, you too are history, avec les neiges d'antan and newsnet in it's time.

Friday, October 19, 2012

Call for Papers ‘Cure or curiosity, What drives autism research?’





Please distribute widely

1st Call for Papers


This is the first call for papers for “Autonomy” The critical Journal of Interdisciplinary Autism Studies, published through the Open Journals System, by the Autreach Press.

We are an open access peer reviewed journal, with the aim of encouraging discourse between the different academic disciplines engaged in autism research, with the focus on being autistic led. We  therefore particularly welcome and encourage papers from autistic scholars who have not been published before.

We invite submissions, Academic Papers, Comment, and Reviews. (This includes reviews of all media including conferences)

The submissions process is on line but not exclusively, so we will also accept papers submitted by email, provided they are in a format that can be understood and edited. Alternative modes of submission will also be considered if this is an access issue, please contact the principal editor for further details

We do not set a house citation style, but do require citation and referencing.

Authors retain copyright but grant the journal a creative commons attribution 3 licence on any material submitted.

Further details can be found on http://www.autreach.info

For any further queries please email the Principal Editor at autonomy@larry-arnold.net

The deadline for the next issue is December 18th 2012

Laurence Arnold PGCert (SpEd) FRSA
Principal Editor

Sunday, September 16, 2012

The Autumn of my years

Is it really three months since I last blogged? Evidently so. I suppose like a lot of ex bloggers I have migrated to Facebook, which I guess is a little bit selfish of me.

Well I have lost over a stone in weight since I last blogged here. Gotto be a reason for that. Oh yes I have been digging for victory haven't I? Of late I have also been eating the produce of my allotment albeit it has been one heck of a struggle against the elements this year, with the rain and the slugs who have had more than there fair share of what I have been trying to grow. I lost a lot of crops that hardly even got started.

Still I know where it is at now, and what seems to grow well. Broad beans did fine, and I got quite a few peas eventually, and now I am waiting for the runner beans to swell out. I have some beetroot that looks healthy enough, and some strange red lettucy salady thing. 

Wasn't I supposed to be some kind of an autism researcher and academic?

Yes I guess I was, but you know how it is, when a new interest comes along. This last week however I was doing my academic bit and presenting at the 6th Lancaster Disability Studies conference, on the Social Construction of the Savant. Now how many academics do you know who can cite Oscar Wilde, C S Lewis, Arthur Figgis (AKA John Cleese) both of Shakespeare's professional fools and the usual suspects Treffert, Howlin and Hermelin in the same paper. I do because I can, like the proverbial dog and it's parts.

Well it has to be said on the Disability Studies circuit you are not anybody until you have experienced me walking out on your presentation at least once. There was the Nebraskan who had the temerity to do a presentation on Amanda Bagg's "in my own language" which he completely buried in the obscure language of cultural studies. As for the guy who was doing a Lacanian analysis. AAAARGH was all that I could say.

Nonetheless there was a strong contingent of allies, with Steve Graby, rising star Damian Milton, who is becoming less mute and inglorious by the day. Mitzi Waltz was also there complementing my performance (sorry I mean presentation) The BBC were also there filming our Damian for a documentary about ABA.

Well did I get drunk in the evenings? Not arf, but then you do, playing your flute in the bar and that sort of thing.

Next week I have a far more sober conference, the Hardest Hit, where I shall be repeating my paper of two years ago, the predictions of which were horribly accurate about the present Governments desire to control expenditure on disabled people by essentially denying the category. There are several ironies about this one. Firstly they don't seem to have got hold of the idea that they should arrange car parking for attendees. Secondly the big joke is the notion of secure and waged academics turning there gaze on the great unwashed and unemployed, it reminds me of the joke about the Pope who wears swimming trunks in the bath.

Then next week also sees the beginning of what will be (definitely this time) my final year of study at Birmingham University. In fact I have to be there tomorrow to sort some administrative stuff out.

Well it has been an interesting year even if I haven't blogged much about it. I don't think I mentioned that I will have three paintings on exhibition at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition centre from this November until the new year. I also have a short book chapter to write for a text book introduction to Disability Studies to be published by Sage next year.

Monday, June 04, 2012

Digging for Victory


In case anyone has wondered what has become of me of late, I should say my life has entered a new stage, or rather it has recovered an old one.

One of the things I very much missed after my mum died was the garden, where I used to take out my frustrations and grow vegetables in a very small urban plot, right in the centre of Coventry.

However that is all history now, I have acquired an allotment. It is simply huge compared with what I have dealt with before.

A little history:

The allotments are situated on what was a former sewage works, and were established in the 1960's. The sewage works must have been built at the end of the 19th Century or the beginning of the last one, and served Foleshill Rural District Council. Anyway the sewage works backed onto the River Sowe at Henley Green, and comprised the lower fields of Henley Mill Farm. The rest of the farm is still a farm today, and it surprising to find in an otherwise urban district. I drive down what is a single track country lane, from the back of Henley College and there it is.

Anyway my allotment came up surprisingly quick.I had applied earlier in the year during the snow, having done a neighbour a favour by taking an old carpet down as he does not have a car. He suggested that I should put my name down and I did.

So far as my allotment goes, it appears that it was formerly held by a group of disabled people, and had been made up with wheelchair paths. It had been abandoned about 6 months ago. The lower part of it however had been left to nature from before as it was too much for the group to cope with.

Since I did not acquire this allotment till May, it has been rather late to do much preparation and planting, as all the digging would have been done over winter.

I have had to clear wild brambles, cut back overgrown willow trees, uproot other shrubs which had taken over, before even contemplating anything else.

As it is a large part is still under tarpaulin until I have either the time and the energy to dig it. I have had to clear what I can with the help of my brother and plant a few crops hoping for the best.

The weather has not been ideal, except for the weeds, brambles and grass, which shoot up everywhere faster than anything I have planted.

Still it is early days yet.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Bloggers build walls and hide behind moats

I have been trying to comment on fellow Autism Hub Blogger Estee Klar Wolfond's  blog against her unfounded insult to William Morris. The security settings defeat this poor dyslexic fool.

But this is what I wanted to say, and you had  better listen, you smug and self satisfied mockers of the true genius of neurodiversity, yes none other than Morris himself, who could combine a ministry to the "swinish rich" with his standing alongside the workers on Bloody Sunday

This is what your blog settings would not allow me to post


"I do remind you again not to be so ignorant about William Morris, he was no stranger to neurodiversity. He had an epileptic daughter, and was possibly TLE or Tourettes himself. I dare say his parents had a lot to put up with, given young William's meltdowns, his adult ones are legend.

I do feel so offended that you are trivializing William Morris' life and struggles of which you apparently know little."

Little you know indeed!!