Skip to main content

Reading in Pictures: Re-visioning Autism and Literature through the Medium of Manga

  • Chapter

Part of the book series: Literary Disability Studies ((LIDIST))

Abstract

Temple Grandin famously has remarked, “I think in pictures. Words are like a second language to me […] When somebody speaks to me, his words are instantly translated into pictures” (19). While Grandin does grant “not all people with autism are highly visual thinkers” and “people throughout the world are on a continuum of visualization skills” (28), she nonetheless believes most autistics “think in visual images” (25) and rely on “visual thinking as the primary method of processing information” (26). If many autistics think in pictures, why is it that Western culture’s narration of the story of autism has relied so heavily upon the written word?

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Buying options

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   99.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD   129.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Works cited

  • Baggs, Amanda. In My Language. Web. 4 July 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  • — “Up in the Clouds and Down in the Valley: My Richness and Yours.” Disability Studies Quarterly 30.1 (2010). Web. 4 July 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  • Birge, Sarah. “No Life Lessons Here: Comics, Autism, and Empathetic Scholarship.” Disability Studies Quarterly 30.1 (2010). Web. 4 July 2012.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grandin, Temple. Thinking in Pictures and Other Reports from My Life with Autism. New York: Vintage, 1995.

    Google Scholar 

  • McCloud, Scott. Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art. New York: Kitchen Sink Press/Harper Perennial, 1993.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mitchell, W. J. T. Picture Theory: Essays on Verbal and Visual Representation. University of Chicago Press, 1994.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mukhopadhyay, Tito. The Mind Tree. New York: Arcade, 2003.

    Google Scholar 

  • How Can I Talk If My Lips Don’t Move? New York: Arcade, 2008.

    Google Scholar 

  • Petersen, Robert S. “The Acoustics of Manga.” In A Comics Studies Reader. Ed. Jeet Heer and Kent Worcester. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2009. 163–71.

    Google Scholar 

  • Prince, Dawn. “The Silence Between: An Autoethnographic Examination of the Language Prejudice and its Impact on the Assessment of Autistic and Animal Intelligence.” Disability Studies Quarterly 30.1 (2010). Web. 4 July 2014.

    Google Scholar 

  • Savarese, Ralph James. “Towards a Postcolonial Neurology: Autism, Tito Mukhopadhyay, and a New Geo-poetics of the Body.” Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies 4.3 (2010): 273–89.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shinohara, Kazuko, and Yoshihiro Matsunaka. “Pictorial Metaphors of Emotion in Japanese Comics.” In Multimodal Metaphor. Ed. Charles J. Forceville and Eduardo Urios-Aparisi. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2009. 265–93.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tobe, Keiko. With the Light: Raising an Autistic Child. Trans. Satsuki Yamashita. 7 vols. New York: Yen Press/Hachette, 2007–10.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yergeau, Melanie. “Circle Wars: Reshaping the Typical Autism Essay.” Disability Studies Quarterly 30.1 (2010). Web. 4 July 2014.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Copyright information

© 2016 Chris Foss

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Foss, C. (2016). Reading in Pictures: Re-visioning Autism and Literature through the Medium of Manga. In: Foss, C., Gray, J.W., Whalen, Z. (eds) Disability in Comic Books and Graphic Narratives. Literary Disability Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137501110_7

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics