New: Sensory Hub

The transition to the new technical set-up is complete and we are now able to begin addressing some of the long-standing issues with the site. You may notice that some of the small fiddly but obvious flaws of the website have now disappeared.

With our freed up resources, we have now created a new Sensory Hub bringing together new tests for exploring sensory, perceptual and bodily experiences.

The hub currently includes:

  • Facial-expression recognition
  • Joint hypermobility
  • Interoceptive awareness
  • Prosopagnosia (face blindness)
  • Misophonia and sound triggers
  • Aphantasia
  • Synesthesia

These tools are intended to support self-understanding, help people describe their experiences and identify needs or useful adjustments. Each test has a printable bottom at the bottom to save your results and take them to a professional if you need to.

We will continue expanding this collection as standardised assessments become available.

Autistic-led theatre project: How I WrotE a book at 6 AND PROOFREAD IT AT 8

An autistic-led theatre project has been shared with Autistic Empire by Maks Marzec, an autistic Polish-British theatre-maker.

The project is called How I WrotE a book at 6 AND PROOFREAD IT AT 8. It is described as a 60-minute bilingual theatre piece exploring autistic masking, childhood self-correction, language, sensory pressure, and the quiet work of trying to seem “fine”.

According to the Crowdfunder page, the show is a bilingual theatre piece “in two bodies” that turns autistic masking into an audience experience through language, movement, sound, light, and the journey of a red pen.

The piece is being developed by an all-neurodivergent team of performers, designers, and theatre-makers. Its makers describe the project as moving beyond diagnosis, explanation, and inspiration, towards a theatrical language built from autistic experience.

The project may be of interest to neurodivergent people, late-diagnosed adults, high maskers, and anyone thinking about what autistic children and young adults are rewarded, corrected, or trained to hide. The Crowdfunder page also frames the work through Polish-British, queer, migrant, bilingual, and mathematical experience.

The current development plan includes at least three by-invitation London development previews in 2026, shaped by audience feedback and sensory calibration. These are described as a focused development stage rather than a commercial ticketed run, with the aim of refining the work, documenting the process, and building towards festival and touring conversations in 2027.

The Crowdfunder target is £35,000. The page says around 75% of the budget is for paying people at equity rates, with the rest covering rehearsal and preview space, props, costumes, audience materials, insurance, running costs, and contingency.

More information is available on the Crowdfunder page:

How I WrotE a book at 6 AND PROOFREAD IT AT 8 on Crowdfunder

 

Announcement: Citizenship is currently closed

Hi all,

it has been the case for several years that the membership part of the site has had substantial problems, technical and social, that have been difficult to administrate. After considering our options, in terms of technical ability, available labour, and dopamine levels, the Autistic Empire is closing its citizenship functions for the time being. Since we started our work in 2018, there are now many other autistic-led membership-based organisations that are sustaining themselves and so this aspect of our community is not as urgent as it once was.

All current citizenship recurring payments are being paused and with the expected drop in income (we have been financially independent of all external funding sources for over five years), we will also be closing down much of our paid-for infrastructure to keep costs manageable. We are currently working on this transition now.

If things change, somehow, citizenship of the Autistic Empire will return.

The Autistic Empire continues to be registered as a company in the UK and will continue trading. The tools and resources on the website will continue to remain available indefinitely. When the transition is complete, we expect to be able to develop new projects that have been unable to be resourced while we were struggling to administrate the rest of the organisation.

The Audible Autism podcast continues at AudibleAutism.com.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to our community. This remains our world.

Monday One – 1st Monday of the Month

Monday One (which runs on the 1st Monday of the month, hence the name) is a one hour online meeting for autistic adults. This is from 8-9pm BST/GMT, online on our Whereby account (this is browser-based so you do not need an account to use it). The link is posted in The Forum to prevent it being scraped.

This is a relatively informal space where what we talk about is determined by who attends. Monday One will be running monthly until at least August 2026.

The first Monday One was a presentation by Sarah on the work and values of the Autistic Empire, which was recorded and uploaded to our YouTube Channel. The link is in the Citizen’s Dashboard or on request (due to the presence of others and Sarah “umming” a lot again).

Support Autism Rights Group Highland (ARGH) – Walking the West Highland Way (July 2025)

A fundraising event from one of our citizens for a worthy cause. Further press coverage available from the Inverness Courier.

Text from ARGH below. 

This year, Joseph Redford is taking on an incredible challenge—walking the iconic West Highland Way to raise funds for Autism Rights Group Highland (ARGH).

Joseph will travel 96 miles, journeying through some of Scotland’s most breathtaking landscapes. As an added challenge, he’ll also stop at every train station between Glasgow and Arisaig, either by getting on or off a train, or both! His adventure begins on 16th July and will conclude by 30th July.

ARGH is a vital, autistic-led organisation, working tirelessly to support and advocate for autistic individuals across the Highland region and beyond. Their efforts make a real difference in promoting understanding, equality, and empowerment within the autistic community.

How You Can Help: Joseph is aiming to raise £750 to support ARGH’s important work. Every donation, no matter the size, will help ensure ARGH can continue providing crucial resources, campaigns, and support services.

If you’d like to contribute, please visit www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/support-argh.

Let’s support Joseph as he takes on this challenge, and together, we can stand in solidarity with autistic individuals and their families.

Podcast Co-Host Wanted

Audible Autism is a podcast that aims to give voice to autistic people from our own internal perspective. It is made for autistic people, by autistic people. We’re looking to talk about autism, and things that would be interesting to autistic people. We’re not trying to explain ourselves to Neurotypical people to ask them for acceptance into their world. Other people do that. This is for us.

In the last 5 years, we have released 34 episodes of Audible Autism, covering a huge variety of topics. We have released interviews with autistic therapists, dancers and civil servants, held discussions on autistic parenting, autistic pride and autistic art, hosted talks on autistic stories and lives, and produced guides to self-organisation and black history month. We aim to showcase autistic life across a wide spectrum (ahem) of experiences and interests.

Our episodes are released via Anchor which has now been acquired by Spotify. The majority of our listenership find our episodes via Spotify’s algorithm, although we would like to increase our marketing.

Our team turns over but currently involved are Odai, as co-host and producer, Luke, as co-host, and Simon, as our sound editor. Episodes are produced on a schedule that suits the current team – formerly fortnightly, they are now released as and when our team has time and availability, or for special occasions.

Due to health reasons, Odai is stepping back from his role as a co-host to focus on his role as a producer. We are therefore looking for a new co-host who can contribute to the team. The current team has talked about what new skills they would like in a new member of the team and we are particularly looking for a co-host who can demonstrate interviewing skills, who can attentively listen to our guests and ask insightful, relevant follow-up questions.

In addition to working on pre and post production, co-hosts can work with other co-hosts or by themselves to produce episodes that suit their interests. You might be asked to interview a particular guest on a subject the producer has identified as important or timely, or you might want to produce your own audioessay on a subject that is meaningful to you. We will accommodate whatever you are interested in.

Audible Autism is an autonomous project hosted within and supported by the Autistic Empire. Please read our five principles and our values to ensure you are aligned with our perspective of autism. Audible Autism team members are strongly encouraged to align with Autistic Empire Citizenship values, but Citizenship is not a requirement and public enrolment is currently closed. However, you must identify as autistic – self-identity is valid.

The team organises via Whatsapp, Basecamp and an FTP server where the audio files are stored. Episodes are recorded on Zencastr, and edited in Logic Pro.

We are not necessarily looking for long-term commitments but we would expect anyone who is interested to be with us for at least a year.

If this interests you or you have further questions, please email [email protected]. For qualified applicants, we have prepared a follow-up test on preparing a sample interview to display your skills.

Are you a young adult with ADHD?

Dear Neurodiversity in/And Creative Research Community,

My name is Leann, and I am a neurodivergent MSc student studying Clinical Mental Health Sciences at the Division of Psychiatry University College London.

I am reaching out to share a participation opportunity with members of this community. This study is part of my MSc dissertation exploring the strengths and positive experiences of young adults with ADHD (UCL Ethics ID: 2025-0842-579).

Participation offers an opportunity to reflect on and celebrate the unique strengths associated with ADHD, which many find to be an empowering experience. Your insights can help challenge negative stereotypes, contributing to a more nuanced and affirming understanding of ADHD. Through this work, we aim to help shift the broader narrative and support young people in embracing all aspects of their neurodiversity ☆

Please find more details through the link below
Thank you!
Best wishes,
Leann Ialamov (she/her)

MSc Clinical Mental Health Sciences UCL

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