Kassiane Asasumasu

Kassiane A. Asasumasu (; born 1982) is an American autism rights activist who is credited for coining several terms related to the neurodiversity movement, including neurodivergent, neurodivergence, and caregiver benevolence. As stated in the text Neurodiversity for Dummies, "Asasumasu's work set the stage for a broader understanding and acceptance of neurological differences", which "continue to be shared, shaped and formed by all sorts of people who recogniz that our world should be accepting, inclusive, and accommodating of people regardless of their neurotype".

Early life Kassiane Asasumasu was born in 1982 and has seven siblings, She was diagnosed as autistic when she was three years old and was bullied for much of her childhood.

Asasumasu has shared that she also has temporal lobe epilepsy and post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of applied behavior analysis.

Asasumasu is Hapa and Asian American. She is of Croatian, Japanese, Mongolian, and Romanian descent.

Contributions

Neurodivergent and neurodivergence Following the rise of the autism rights movement in the 1990s, many autistic advocates, including Asasumasu, recognized that a wide variety of people experienced the world in ways similar to autistic people, despite not being autistic. As a result, Asasumasu coined the related terms neurodivergent and neurodivergence circa 2000.

According to Asasumasu, these terms refer to those "whose neurocognitive functioning diverges from dominant societal norms in multiple ways". not just people with neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and dyslexia. She further emphasized that it should not be used to exclude people but rather to include them. This term provided activists a way to advocate for increased rights and accessibility for non-autistic people who do not have typical neurocognitive functioning.

As stated in the text Neurodiversity for Dummies, "Asasumasu's work set the stage for a broader understanding and acceptance of neurological differences", which "continue to be shared, shaped and formed by all sorts of people who recogniz that our world should be accepting, inclusive, and accommodating of people regardless of their neurotype". to describe the overarching societal assumption that caregivers are "angelic, saint-like figure" for offering their time, energy, and financial resources to care for a disabled person. In alignment with this belief, ignorance is the only harm caregivers can do to the disabled person in their care.

Publications

Book chapters

Journal articles