“Autism and Rhetoric,” Paul Heilker and Melanie Yergeu

IWA: 4/12/13

Summary: In their article, “Autism and Rhetoric,” Paul Heilker and Melanie Yergeu attempt to tell their audience, mainly English professors and scholars, that autism can be considered a form of rhetoric. They argue that autism has enough of its own way of speaking and therefore can be considered its own form of rhetoric.

Synthesis: This article is a lot like the Smitherman and Flynn articles because it discusses a more ignored community and the way they communicate. Although autism is not a race or gender it is still consists of its own group of people and all three of these articles discuss the language patterns within these groups.

Afterthoughts: I enjoyed this article mainly because it was our last one and I was very motivated. On a different note it was nice to relate it to my other classes. In my CSD class we discussed autism and the different ways people with autism communicate. It was cool to be able to semi link it back to this class and the article I was reading.