Neuroqueering Somatics: Join the Conversation
A Conversation at the Intersection of Neurodivergence and Somatic Practice.
The neurodiversity paradigm emerged around 20 years ago and only began to gain more widespread recognition over the last 5-10 years. Too late for me in some very important ways.
When Dr. Walker and other autistic folks were cultivating these ideas in early semi-private online spaces back in 2004, long before social media, I was still navigating life (and parenting) without a framework that could have helped me understand myself and my loved ones so much more clearly.
Looking back, I now understand that I’m dyslexic. I have visual processing challenges and heightened sensory sensitivities.
My verbal fluency masked my disabilities, and my gifts went unrecognized. I was suspended in a holding pattern and caught in the illusion of neuronormativity.
Without the language of the neurodiversity paradigm, I had no framework to make sense of it all.
So I masked. I struggled. I passed.
And, I was constantly met with quizzical looks: “She seems smart… why can’t she do this simple thing?”
I wish I’d had this knowledge sooner. I wish I could have been a better advocate for myself, and for the brilliant, sensitive loved ones in my life who were harmed by school systems and institutional structures that didn’t see or support them.
And yes, even in somatic spaces, I’ve encountered ableism. There were things I couldn’t do, and it was assumed I didn’t belong. But I did. And I do.
This is why this conversation is so important to me — why the treatment of neurodivergent people is a civil rights issue. Our needs are valid. Accommodations are essential.
And understanding ourselves through this lens can be healing, even liberating.
Adina Docter
ISMETA has invited me to curate a series of events on the intersections of neurodivergence and somatics. If you’d like to stay in the loop about those upcoming offerings, click here to sign up. Or, sign up for my newsletter, and you’ll be the first to know.
A conversation at the intersection of neurodivergence and somatic practice with Dr. Nick Walker and Katy Higgins Lee, to discuss the creative possibilities that emerge when we practice neuroqueering somatics.
The concept of neuroqueering was coined by Dr. Walker and refers to a practice of intentionally subverting normativity and embracing neurocognitive diversity.
As somatic practitioners, we practice being with the unknown and the emerging, and we strive to hold space without forcing resolution. And yet, the values of the dominant culture persist. Too often, we rely on assumptions about what bodyminds should do, how they should move, and what regulated or healed looks like. So, even in healing-centered spaces, normative biases can unconsciously shape our approach.
This conversation aims to explore the creative possibilities that emerge when we can subvert normative paradigms and neuroqueer our practices—not just as an afterthought but as a central, generative framework.
This conversation is organized by ISMETA member Adina Docter MSME/T, neurodivergent movement educator and somatic therapist, and founding member of Divergent Design Studios, and is hosted by the ISMETA Equity, Justice, and Accessibility Committee.
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Dr. Nick Walker has been continually engaged in various forms of transformative somatic work throughout his life, including four and a half decades (and counting) as a practitioner and teacher of aikido and two decades as a core member of the experimental physical theatre group Paratheatrical Research. He is a professor at California Institute of Integral Studies, where he currently teaches in the undergraduate Psychology program and the Somatic Psychology master’s program, as well as being one of the principal architects of the institute’s new Bachelor of Science degree program in Psychedelic Studies. Dr. Walker has been a leading thinker on neurodiversity for more than 20 years, and is best known for his foundational work on Neuroqueer Theory and his influential essay collection Neuroqueer Heresies. Much of his scholarly work explores the edges and intersections of somatics, depth psychology, neurodivergence, consciousness, and creativity. He also writes speculative fiction, including the urban fantasy webcomic Weird Luck. He holds a seventh-degree black belt in aikido and serves as senior instructor at the Aiki Arts Center dojo in Berkeley, California. |
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Katy Higgins Lee (she/her) is a multiply neurodivergent somatic psychotherapist, clinical supervisor, and continuing education provider. Katy also provides psychoeducation and advocacy through social media and is a homeschooling/unschooling parent, writer, and gardener. |
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