On the Autism Spectrum in High Tech Brainport

On April 2, we celebrate the World Autism Awareness Day. But there are many spectrums of autism. While Brainport Eindhoven is the smartest city, with the largest number of patents per inhabitant, it is also a city with relatively many people that are "on the spectrum". That seems more that sheer coincidence: There may well be a correlation between prevalence of autism and "systemizers: who have an urge to understand how systems work. And that thrives well in cities with many centers of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics)? On April 27, 2021, we had three wonderful guests to help us guide through the colorful and bright side of autism. First, Dr. Barry Prizant, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, who received widespread recognition and many honors in his career. He is an invited speaker at the UN for World Autism Awareness Day back in 2013. Our second guest, Teddy Lytle, an Associate Artistic Director of Spectrum Theatre Company, a Neurodiverse Theatre Company in US. Our third guest is a very enthusiastic mum Tally Nothey from London, who calls herself as Accidental Hero and is working on a lot of Autism Awareness activities in UK. This podcast is a recording of a program on Radio4Brainport.org, hosted by Karishma Vij and Jean-Paul Linnartz. Chaitali Sengupta summarizes the impact of autism in a dedicated poem.