Neurodiversity Documentary

The Neurodiversity Documentary project is an idea that emerged out of the discussions at the Autistic Collaboration Auckland meeting in December 2019. The project aims to engage with autistic and otherwise neurodivergent people over the course of 2020 to jointly produce the content for a multi-part in-depth documentary series as well as a full-length documentary movie (60 to 120 minutes) about neurodiversity, and to publish at least the first parts of the series in 2020.

There is an urgent need to educate the general public about the lives of neurodivergent people from a perspective that is not in any way influenced by the autism medical industrial complex.

There are two important audiences for the documentary:

People who are autistic or otherwise neurodivergent, but who are currently not aware of the fact – so that these people are given tools for finding and connecting with neurodivergent peers.
Members of the wider public who are only aware of autism and neurodiversity via the lenses of mainstream news media, corporate PR campaigns, and the autism medical industrial complex.

We envisage to publish the documentary online in the public domain, and to organise local screenings in as many countries and locations as possible.

All neurodivergent participants in the documentary form the editorial board:

The editorial board determines by democratic consensus which parts of contributions to include. Individual board members have the ability to influence how their contribution is edited and integrated, and have the ability to withdraw their contribution or parts thereof in case they feel their perspective is misrepresented.

Key themes

Reflections on life, relationships and society by autistic and neurodivergent elders and neurodiversity activists
The development of unique individual autistic and neurodivergent learning systems, skills, knowledge, and world views
From learning about autism and neurodiversity, via identifying as autistic and/or neurodivergent, to the social model of disability
Diagnosing the ills of society, and the dangers of neurotypical monoculture and human education/normalisation factories
Examples of success on autistic and creative neurodivergent terms, and of the challenges, struggles, and trauma along the way
Autistic culture, intersectionality, autistic community, and autistic collaboration

Realisation

This project is currently in the design stage. The core project team involves over 30 neurodivergent artists, professionals, activists and scholars from all corners of the world, including:

Allison Hoffmann, New York, US
Anna Charest, New Hampshire, US
Irma Aguilar-Delfin, México
Jenna Mikes, Florida, US
Jorn Bettin, New Zealand
Mark Leslie, New York, US
Nick Walker, California, US
Panda Mery, United Kingdom
Quinn Dexter, Bristol, United Kingdom
Ryan Boren, US
Sandra Koren, Slovenia
Sarah Bettin, New Zealand
Slade Winstone, New Zealand

Techniques

Individual reflections
Dialogues
Interviews
Reading of texts submitted by non verbal autistic people

Call for participation

We are looking for further autistic and otherwise neurodivergent people from all over the world, in particular in countries in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and South America, who are interested in contributing material and in assisting with various skills in producing the documentary:

Script development
Video and music editing
Narration
Video production
Music production
Participation in interviews
Translation into English and into other languages
Online marketing
Organising local screenings

We realise that the autistic community has already produced many high quality videos about autism and neurodiversity. If you would like to make existing content that is aligned with the themes outlined above available for reuse, this is another option of contributing to the project.

To participate in this project, you can either email Jorn.Bettin@s23m.com or use the form below to indicate which skills you would like to contribute.