“Everything is always changing”: Autism, normalcy, and progress in Elizabeth Moon’s the speed of dark and Nancy Fulda’s “movement”

Abstract

There are nearly as many definitions for science fiction as there are people writing about it, and consensus is hard to come by in the field; one common idea, however, is that science fiction (SF) is a literature of change. As such, SF looks to the future and emphasizes narratives of progress or, conversely, dystopian narratives of progress distorted or interrupted. Many well-known SF texts have focused on technological progress, from the beginnings of SF through the Golden Age, cyberpunk, and beyond. In the mid-twentieth century, the kinds of progress included in SF expanded to include social and cultural progress as well as technological advancements. Progress in SF texts is therefore marked not only in scientific advances but also in socio-political change. Some issues and inequalities remain unaddressed within SF, however; despite the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1991, ableism continues to be prevalent both in the real world and in the stories we tell about ourselves and our futures. Sarah Einstein argues in “The Future Imperfect” that “[t]here is too little SF written that envisions a fully accessible, universally designed future” and indicates a need for more consideration of disability in SF and a more thorough imagining of the future of physical difference. Outside SF, on the other hand, Ian Hacking has noted that within the last decade autism stories have flourished “when they were virtually non-existent a quarter century ago” (632).