DUGGAN
A writer can claim any number of identities.
They may see their nationality or their culture as key to their work (or their gender, or their sexual identity).
DUGGAN chooses to identify as an autistic poet because so many misconceptions exist about those with autism, and so few autistic voices are represented in literature and the arts.
Autism is not an incidental factor, like hair colour or body type. It is central to an autistic person's identity, shaping their relationships with others and their sense of themselves.
Why 'an autistic poet'?
foreword to
'Fully Formed'
Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award
2023
While those with bipolar disorder are often regarded as disproportionately sensitive or inclined toward genius, negative stereotypes about autism prevail. The truth - as ever - is more complex. Autistic people are many times more likely to have clinically diagnosed bipolar disorder than non-autistic people and many, like this poet, live with both conditions on a daily basis.
One of the most persistent prejudices about autistic people is that they are unfeeling, or incapable of empathy. This is not only inaccurate and highly damaging - it is exactly contrary to the truth. There are, in fact, two modes of empathy: cognitive empathy, which relates to the ability to “recognize” others’ emotions in their faces, or to interpret the unspoken codes people communicate between them (which those of us with autism can struggle to decipher) and affective empathy, which is where we “feel with” someone else. And it turns out that those on the autism spectrum can possess this latter ability to an extent which exceeds those who are neurotypical.
The poems in this collection are unashamedly accessible. They won’t try to dazzle or impress, but to serve as evidence that those of us with ASC - though we often fail to understand the social niceties and struggle with personal intimacy - are sensitive to others’ worries and their pain. That we can write about Ourselves and our unique way of experiencing the world - and Others. That we may not always fit in. But we can belong.