"Maternidade atípica e autismo" : trilhando caminhos de dor, pertencimento e ativismo nas mídias sociais

Abstract

The present work aims to understand the use of social media as a possibility of building networks to support the exercise of motherhood of autistic children and autistic mothers. I also seek to understand the construction of support networks for the exercise of breastfeeding of autistic children, the understanding of relationships, tensions related to motherhood and autism. This is a study with ethnographic framework, whose methodological choice was directed due to the social isolation caused by the covid-19 pandemic. This work consists of a qualitative analysis performed from a universe of 10 participating women, among these, 6 are also autistic. The work, an ethnography for internet, was consolidated based on participant observation through social media, especially Instagram, but also on Youtube, Podcasts and other digital platforms, open conversations carried out through Instagram's own chat tools and interactions also by WhatsApp and Email, in addition to the use of field notebooks. The study was supported by discussions about disability studies, as well as on theories of care, studies on motherhood and also on autism, some aspects wrapped up in feminism, support networks and the use of social media. When inquiring about the construction of support networks circumscribed to digital, but with the possibility of extrapolating the online, maternity was found as a vector of composition of forces in the face of the difficulties faced by mothers and children, in addition to conflicts amid the social and political misaffairs around autism. Motherhood appeared as a place of solitude, but also as a political place, of representativeness, of resistance to unite subjectivities and foster the feeling of belonging.