"In My Language" Reflection

I really appreciated watching Mel Baggs' video "In My Language". I particularly found it really interesting how they described their language to be the way they interact with the world around them, rather than putting explicit meaning into every action. I never really considered stimming to be a form of communication, however, the materials for this week certainly informed me that these are definitely forms of communication. Mel's points about verbal communication being the standard language of communication are really strong. It is very frustrating and wrong that people who communicate through non verbal forms of communication are treated as less than human. This is directly related to the potent ableism that exists in our world, and how our value as human beings very much depends on how we can labor and how much we can produce. It is unjust and simply incorrect to think that those who can't communicate verbally 1) don't have as much value as others and 2) isn't capapble of producing anything. 

I also appreciated Amythest Schaber's video on stimming. I didn't know that stimming is a way that autistic people can cope with sensory processing disorder. It makes a lot of sense that stimming helps people just get through a very inaccesible and overwhelming world that was only built with able bodied and neurotypical people in mind. I also liked that she pointed out how stimming is a natural form of expression for a lot of autistic people, and why it is so damaging to try to suppress people's stimming, especially when they are children.