Activism
The Autistic Self Advocacy Network promotes autism awareness and acceptance through public policy initiatives, research reform and cross-disability collaboration, community outreach, college advocacy, publishing, and employment initiatives.
ASAN is the Autistic community partner for the Academic Autistic Partnership In Research and Education (AASPIRE). The AASPIRE project brings together the academic community and the Autistic community, in a research format called community-based participatory research, to develop and perform research projects relevant to the needs of autistic adults.
In 2012, ASAN began the annual Autism Campus Inclusion (ACI) Summer Institute, a week-long workshop teaching Autistic students to engage in activism and advocacy on their campuses. The Loud Hands Project, a transmedia publishing effort for curating and hosting submissions by Autistic people about voice, has also been active during 2012, in the form of a Kickstarter campaign and an anthology.
In April 2013, as part of Autism Acceptance Month – a counter-movement against the cure-focused Light It Up Blue and Autism Awareness Month movements – ASAN launched an Autism Acceptance Month web site.
Read more about this topic: Autistic Self Advocacy Network