Treat and educate autism: a current political scene - interview with Pierre Delion

Abstract

The interview discusses the current relations between medicine, pedagogy, and psychology concerning the work with children who have pervasive developmental disorders and tend to be classified as ASD (autism spectrum disorders), and also gives an overview of the experience of Professor Pierre Delion at university and in public service in France. In today’s world, in such a specific moment when a significant tension settled around the matter of the conceptualization and the work with autism, after controversial government decisions that occurred in several countries, notably Brazil and France, it is aimed to interrogate Professor Delion about his experience as a doctor, for decades accustomed to working together with educators, psychologists and general caregivers of these children. If on the one hand, it is possible to notice in our present context a trend of pedagogical means to tilt towards the medico-psychological logic that is to be dominant in the specific case of dealing with autistic children, on the other it is curious to follow the thoughts of a doctor doing the opposite approach and stressing the importance of not losing sight of the educational character in dealing with these children. The main objective of this interview is to stand out the key elements to understand autism and the work with it, from a consolidated experience through research and daily work in an institution, without succumbing to ideological controversies that dispute fields from positions previously established.