ABSTRACT
This chapter has developed from a personal and professional curiosity about the representation of girls and women with autistic spectrum disorders (ASD). It uses vignettes of girls who attended dramatherapy groups to illustrate how the therapy enabled them to integrate more fully with their peers. The focus of the groups was to encourage social skills and self-esteem through creative activities, enabling the young people to express their thoughts and emotions through drawing, drama and play. The increased use of social media provides girls with ASD with a different form of communication, which allows them to be part of a group without having to experience physical proximity or read social cues such as eye contact and body language. Diagnosis of ASD is based on the triad of impairments: social interaction, social language and communication, and social imagination, identified by Wing and Gould. The positive effect of music therapy on children with ASD has been well documented.
