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We Move Together: A Review of a Wonderful Book on Disability

Cover of the book We Move Together [image: Book cover with an orange background. An illustration of the lower halves of five folks is at the top: A yellow guide dog, a person with brown skin using a cane, a person with brown skin standing with their hand on their hip, a person with white skin and crossed ankles standing with their hand on their hip, and a person with brown skin using a wheelchair.] Review by Kate Ryan We Move Together is a new picture book by a diverse team of authors (Kelly Fritsch, Anne McGuire, and Eduardo Trejos) who have come together to write a love letter to the disability community. It is, in a word, fantastic. It is empowering, it is interesting, it is understandable, it is relevant—I could go on all day about how much I love this book. Unfortunately, as I discovered to my dismay, it…

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The First Tendrils of Communication

Photo © Shannon Des Roches Rosa [image: Orange and purple flowers among green leaves.] Cal Montgomery montgomerycal.wordpress.com twitter.com/Cal__Montgomery For Mel Baggs and Phil Smith, who knew, and know, communion with the wild places better than I can imagine. Do you remember how you learned to communicate? If you communicate pretty typically, odds are it wasn’t perfect, but it included something like: you reached out socially, and people reached back. You looked at them; they gazed adoringly back at you. You smiled; they smiled back and waved. “Hi, Baby! Hi! Oh, what a beautiful face!” You laughed; they reveled in your chortles and giggles and were silly in the hope that you would laugh again. You cried; they held you and comforted you and tried to figure out what was making you miserable. You called out at night; they pulled themselves out of exhausted slumber, scooped you up, and blearily cuddled…

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Welcoming Autism Into Pixar’s World: An Interview With Loop Director Erica Milsom

For people in under-represented communities—autistic people included—there is nothing quite like seeing “someone who moves like you” in mainstream storytelling. We talked with Pixar’s Erica Milsom, who wrote and directed the lyrical SparkShorts film Loop, about the importance of listening to people who actually inhabit the worlds creators want to bring to the screen, the power of storytelling and representation, why it matters that Loop’s autistic character Renee is both a girl and a person of color, and the importance of connection on a purely human level—especially between people who communicate or act differently from each other. Loop writer and director Erica Milsom. Photo courtesy Pixar. [image: A white woman with a silvery-gray bob and clear-framed glasses.] Content note: mention of children of color killed by police Thinking Person’s Guide to Autism: Erica, I just want to thank you so much for agreeing to this interview, and for the work…