Just bought Aspergirls. :-)

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There's a lot not to like about the idea of empowering in the context of disabled people or other people who are oppressed in some way. It puts the focus in the wrong place.

That said I'm still interested in the book.

I'll also repeat as I've said on other threads where this book comes up. There's also a book that's an anthology by autistic women, called Women from Another Planet? I can't give a uniform review of it because parts continue to go way over my head, but I really liked some parts of it for talking about things people rarely seem to acknowledge about autistic people. Like one part about how our attachment to objects doesn't necessarily mean we are living in a lifeless world, but rather that many of us see objects as having their own kind of life. (Things like that, where our perception of the world has major differences from other people in our cultures, seem to be talked about way too little among all the people just describing our lives in roughly the same ways all the time.)

this is the mental image that pops into my mind with all this talk of "superheroines" and "supergirl syndrome".

From what I heard, the reason as to why it was called "Aspergirls" is just that "Girls with Asperger's" was a bit long, and the author kept shortening it.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksA-eACgrfY[/youtube]

As for the concept of "empowering", I interpreted it like this:

For a long time, the symptoms of AS were mainly recognized in men, not women. So many women were silently dealing with the symptoms on an everyday basis without knowing it. Maybe they didn't realize there was a name for it. Or, perhaps they were told "You can't have AS, only men have it. You're just shy/depressed/bipolar/ocd/whatever." That sort of thing. The idea, then, (and what I believe is the goal of the book) was to empower these women by getting the word out.

Knowledge is power, as they say. And for a lot of people, learning about yourself is a big step to then being able to take steps to improve your life. For example, working with your strengths, not dwelling on your weaknesses. But if you don't really understand the problem or if you deny it exists, then it's very difficult to find help.

(Edit for clarification: And it's not so much that AS can or should be cured [which I disagree with], but more so that you can find ways to better manage your life and understand yourself and your behaviors on a deeper level. It takes the problem out of the realm of moral failing and helps to offer an explanation for what you might be experiencing and why. To me, this is very positive.)

Also, I don't think there is any real "feminist" message embedded in the title, though I do admit that the word empower is a bit emotionally and politically charged. Probably unnecessarily so. Maybe the author should have picked a different way of wording it. Whatever the case, it shouldn't detract from the content of the book. A title is only a title. If you like what the book has to say, then that should be good enough.

Okay, ordered.

"Also a lot of these books don't seem detailed enough.
I find the phrase "with Asperger's Syndrome" is very vague and unhelpful.
It doesn't explain what the actual sensory issues are for the person concerned.
It seems to be a "waste bucket" of lots of developmental and sensory conditions, some of which may be quite different from each other and have different causes."

Bingo. I do feel that the term Asperger Syndrome is rather vague and broad, it seems everyone who has had social problems is being labeled with Asperger Syndrome these days regardless of other factors. But the problem with further categorizing the social difficulties is that we run the risk of further typecasting people and confining them to assigned labels. If we divided Asperger Syndrome or any other disorder into different disorders with more concise definitions, we are implying that those diagnosed will be the same in each aspect of their development. Aspies and any one else with any other disorder, should be treated as individuals not as textbook definitions. People could have different aspects of specific disorders while lacking other aspects, I do not like guidebooks because they may give the family member/educator/caretaker/professional false expectations (both good and bad) about the respective disorder and the individual who is diagnosed with that label could end up picking up negative behavior from others who bear that label.

Seriously? Three words is not long at all for a title. I have a book on my shelf with a title over 30 words, granted it's from the 19th century. Aspergirls is one of the lamest titles for a book I've ever seen. I'd be deterred from purchasing a book with at title like that. It reminds me of some shortened text speak. I think girls with Asperger's can handle two extra words that can actually be found in some type of dictionary.

Well, you can't please everyone, I guess. xD I'm sure she thought it was clever. And the publisher thought so too, seeing as how the title stuck.

I find it a bit lame, but not bad enough that I'd avoid the book. I am going to look up that other one too when I get a chance.

Exactly.

There seems to be this "Supergirl" archetype that keeps cropping up again and again in American TV shows. The girl that has to lead a double life saving the world, be pretty, do lots of extra-curricular activities and her homework.


Examples from Disney:

Kim Possible

Malina from The Emperor's New School

Hannah Montana


Also:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Word Girl from PBS


A lot of these girls seem to get their superhuman strength from doing cheerleading practice, like someone I used to know.

This person watched a lot of American shows like this.

Where I come from, women tend to be shown on TV as whiny, chatty, argumentative or catty.

I suppose that if girls were just shown doing ordinary things and being boring, people would switch off.

There was a phrase "Girl Power" kicking about during the 90s.
I was "roped into" doing a Science contest at school. I found myself in an all girl group. The teacher said that we had "Girl Power". Rubbish, it was just an all female group. These females, including me, went on to do very boring and ordinary jobs. We didn't save the world. Maybe we didn't do enough cheerleading practice to power ourselves up. But that wasn't an option at my old school.

Reading through the Amazon preview this book looks really good and is number one on my wish list.

Just wanted to put my 2c in on the idea of labels being horrible/false, etc...

What I like about learning about Asperger's, etc, is that it isn't just a "label" stuck on people. There are actual neurological differences in one's brain. And that these differences explain why certain people behave differently to others. I like to learn that "aaahh so THAT is what is happening in my brain that causes that particular behaviour". I find it difficult that people just look at you like you're weird and wrong and that you "create" this behaviour as part of some sort of stupid mind game when really, it is simply that you have different wiring in your brain to them. They are REAL behaviours, not just created ones for some sort of psychological gain/game.

And I am sure that every person in this World has differences in their own brain in certain ways to others, too.

But for asperger's, there are a set of general ones that can generally fit a certain category. For example, I recently read that people with asperger's have a larger than average amygdala which certainly explains many things, in particular the meltdowns and the sudden anger and the emotional sensitivity and why it is so much stronger than most people and why it doesn't take as "big" a trigger. This makes me think "oh ok, so it is simply just that my amygdala is larger that explains this stuff, it isn't because I am a bad person". This then adds to my own Self identity, my own Self Confidence to stand strong in who I am, and this is great

Argh, I am tired, hope those thoughts made sense lol

As for the book, I actually just got it too and am enjoying it

Liz

Aspergirls and Women From Another Planet? arrived today, finally.

Aspergirls is fairly good so far. A lot to digest. Despite the title, I do not find it "empowering" as such - just informative.