Making classics better though autism and classical myth...

When I last posted on this blog - right at the start of this month - the website for ACCLAIM, the network for anyone interested in autism and classical myth, was not long live. And it was growing, as was our new twitter account. 

Snap shot of @AcclaimNetwork - with details
of Cora Beth Fraser's interview and my upcoming
contribution to "Making Classics Better"

The ACCLAIM website is continuing to grow, and I am so very pleased to share that I've been contacted by several people interested in the topic, including autistic academics and people with autistic relatives. One result of these contacts is that I shall be going - remotely - into a school's autism base later this summer term to do a session with their students!

A few more updates... Adam Soyler's interview with me is live! Here I talk about autism, mythology, why autism and mythology connect and why the activities I'm developing have taken a Herculean turn. Here's a screen shot of the start of the interview:

I've been struck that some of the things that Cora Beth Fraser says in her interview with Adam, also now up, fit my reflections...

One final thing: I shall be contributing to "Making Classics Better" next week (Weds 28th April) at a remote session at Reading University - as part of their summer series of papers by people seeking to find different and more inclusive ways of doing classics. Here's my title and abstract:

What Makes Classical Myth an Ideal Topic for Autistic Children?

Autistic people can have rich imaginative lives – contra one of the “myths” of autism, perpetuated not least because it can be hard for an autistic person to communicate feelings and desires. In this paper, Susan Deacy will set out how and why classical myth can “speak” to autistic children, and engage the imaginations of autistic children. She will focus especially on a set of lessons she is developing based on stories about Hercules – a figure who can exemplify particularly well what it can be like to negotiate the world as an autistic person – as part of the European Research Council-funded project Our Mythical Childhood and the ACCLAIM (Autism Connecting with Classically-Inspire Mythology) Network.