Autism and language: discussions based on theory of enunciation

Abstract

Autism is perceived, according to the International Classification of Diseases in its tenth edition (ICD-10), as a pervasive developmental disorder with particular characteristics manifested before the age of three years: social disgust, motor stereotypies, difficulty in using imagination, significant deviations in language. Since its inclusion in the scientific annals in 1943, after the publication of Autistic Disturbance of Afecctive Contact, psychiatrist Leo Kanner, it is usual in studies of autism to describe and classify the language according to their presence (echolalia) or absence (or silence sounds stereotypical), ignoring the situational context, the possibility of meaning and its uniqueness. In this paper we present the autism from the perspective of the Utterance of Linguistics, by reference to Emile Benveniste, and through the language of an autistic child, seven years old, in speech therapy intervention, we aimed to fi nd the marks of a subject language , which makes use of the language and is enunciated in the act of speech. We found that during speech therapy on autistic person, it is essential that initially the therapist takes the place of speaker, to wohon the fragmented language can be directed so that the marks of enunciation can be established, and the ego (the Autistic) can be built through the play of oppositions and alternations between you and the ego in speech.