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Giving Voice to Non-Speakers: Language, Respect, and the Power of Naming
For the longest time, I used the term non-speaking synonymously with non-verbal, having been taught ‘non-verbal’ in graduate school. Since that time, new terms and definitions have emerged with the advent of a variety of disability rights movements. Person-First Language Person-first...
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Building Community and Advocacy: From Voiceless to SEEN and Heard
I got used to being silent. It was the loneliness and being invisible that was soul crushing. Being able to finally say anything I wanted as a nonspeaking autistic with apraxia was liberating. I have never been able to communicate by using my mouth. When I was a child, I did speak a few...
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Connecting With Nonspeakers: A Practical Guide
April traditionally brings showers, but in my world, it brings Autism Awareness Month – or is it Autism Acceptance Month, or is it Autism Action Month? It seems the verbiage changes from year to year. Awareness is good, acceptance is great, but action is the key to inclusion. For me, April means...
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Re-Envisioning Our Unnecessarily Disabled Futures
Most disabled adults are forced to live segregated, impoverished lives absent of the security, life expectancy, community, and agency that all human beings deserve. For those of us from historically marginalized communities, including non-speakers, the isolation can be even more profound. The life...
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Lessons From Listening to a Typer: Stony Brook Medicine School of Social Welfare Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Other Related Disabilities (LEND) Fellowship Program
Director's Perspective It was July 2022, and I had just finished my first year as the Director of the Stony Brook University Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Other Related Disabilities (SBU LEND) Program. Invited to present on the Research Panel for the I-ASC Motormorphosis...
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“The Best Medicine Is Respect!” Creating a Supportive Healthcare Environment for Nonspeakers
For around 30% of people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), verbal speech is limited, unreliable, or unavailable (Jaswal et al., 2026). Autistic people who are nonspeaking use a variety of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) to communicate; this includes picture-based systems,...
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Advancing the Rights-Based Inclusion of People Who Need and Use AAC: A Guide to Allyship
People often ask CommunicationFIRST for our recommendations for interacting with people who need and use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) tools and supports,1 including nonspeaking autistic people, autistic people who are sometimes able to speak, and people with other...
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Presuming Competence: What It Really Means and Why It Is Life Changing
Presuming competence is such a core foundational principle for people working with non-speakers to understand. It is the very first thing we talk about in our training programs and a topic we revisit in every coaching session. Parents, staff, therapists, teachers, and anyone else interacting with...
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The Miracle Project’s “Express Yourself” Program Gives Nonspeaking/Multi-Modal Artists the Stage
The Miracle Project (TMP), founded in 2004, is internationally recognized as the first systematic, evidence-based program to use expressive and performing arts to improve quality of life and relationships for autistic individuals while challenging negative societal stereotypes through authentic...
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Life Through an Autistic Lens: All Those Steps
There is a glob of peanut butter on my kitchen floor. There is also one on the floor next to my desk, in the middle of my living area, and in front of my couch. A browny-orange trail is also dripping downwards to my elbow, but I leave it there for the moment. There’s a tissue box on my bed and...
