On the Intersection of Queerness and Neurodivergence

This event will be streamed live online with an interactive Q&A. Instructions on how to join will be emailed to registrants shortly before the event. This event will be recorded and will be available to watch on our YouTube channel and portions of the audio will be released on our podcast.

If you need to request accessibility accommodations, please email publicprograms@ciis.edu at least one week prior to the event. For more information, explore our Frequently Asked Questions.

Over the past 17 years, Nick Walker has played a key role in the emergence of the neurodiversity paradigm—a framework for scholarship, practice, and social justice work where treating human neurocognitive variations such as autism, dyslexia, and ADHD as medical pathologies or “disorders” is understood to be a form of systemic oppression along the same lines as the pathologizing of homosexuality in the 19th and 20th centuries.

Join queer autistic author and educator Dr. Walker for an uplifting conversation with writer Dan Glenn exploring the edges and intersections of neurodiversity, gender, Queer Theory, embodiment, creativity, somatic psychology, and the human capacity for transformation. Dr. Walker shares insights from her latest book, Neuroqueer Heresies, a decade’s worth of her most influential writings on the neurodiversity paradigm and autistic empowerment along with her radical conceptualization of Neuroqueer Theory––which applies a Queer Theory lens to neurodiversity.

Discover how queerness and neurodivergence intersect, and how we can liberate ourselves from the strictures of both heteronormativity and neuronormativity.

Nick Walker is a queer, transgender, flamingly autistic author and educator whose work explores the edges and intersections of somatic psychology, queer theory, neurodiversity, and creative transformation. Dr. Walker is a core faculty member in the Somatic Psychology and undergrad Psychology programs at CIIS, a lifelong zen practitioner, senior aikido instructor at the Aiki Arts Center in Berkeley, and co-creator of the Weird Luck webcomic. Her writings can be found at her website.


Dan Glenn is a PhD candidate in the Transformative Studies program at CIIS. His dissertation is on the personal daimon—a guiding internal or external force said to urge people toward purpose, destiny, or fully becoming who they are—and its potential as a catalyst for both personal and social transformation. He was a Center for Writing and Scholarship Fellow at CIIS for three years and was a co-instructor for PhD Bridge Scholars, a three-year pilot program to support doctoral students on the journey toward dissertation writing. As part of his work with the Writing Center, Dan developed and hosted a podcast called Subversive Studies (originally Creative Inquiry)—the podcast is available on Soundcloud. He currently works as an editor and writing coach (https://nightseaeditingwriting.com). You can learn more about Dan and his work, and read some of his writing at his website. 

We are grateful to our Bookstore Partner:

Marcus Books is the nation’s oldest Black-owned independent bookstore celebrating its 60th year. Marcus Books’ mission is to provide opportunities for Black folks and their allies to celebrate and learn about Black people everywhere.