On November 29, 2025, Wikimedia Korea hosted a special yet event, titled “Wikipedia Records Neurodiversity.”

Neurodiversity means a perspective and social movement that urges society to respect and accept developmental identities — such as autism, ADHD, and dyslexia as forms of diversity.

Wikimedia Korea recognized that social participation and Wikimedia engagement for these individuals have been limited and has been supporting their contributions to Wikimedia projects. As part of these efforts, we invited Professor Kim So Yoon of the Department of Education at Korea University, a first-generation neurodiversity researcher.

Meeting Korea’s 1st Generation Neurodiversity Researcher

Professor Kim explained about the process of understanding, supporting, and recording neurodiversity.

She began with the definition of neurodiversity, discussed the medical model of disability and the resulting stigma, and introduced the social model of disability as a new perspective. She concluded the lecture by mentioning her positive support for neurodiversity and the necessity for changes in social structure.

The audience including neurodivergent people, supporters, and activists with only a superficial understanding of neurodiversity deeply learned about the concept. WMKR’s manager in charge of neurodiversity support also evaluated it as a good opportunity to review the trend of numerous foreign studies and update their knowledge.

The part the speaker emphasized most was the pathway through which autistic people realize their diagnosis. According to research, parents often inform the individual of their autism diagnosis late, refuse to inform them, or do not inform them at all, leading many autistic people to find out belatedly through documents. The audience shared this awareness of the problem and listened with deep empathy for the professor’s lecture.

The speaker followed up by reviewing some Wikipedia articles and suggested her idea for improvement of them:

• Changing the term “Autism epidemic/disease” (자폐증) to “Autism” (자폐).
• Discovering positive examples of stimming or self-stimulatory behavior behavior.
• Recording extension of neurodiversity discourse within Korea.
• Presenting principles and examples of positive practices for neurodiversity in local communities, etc.
• Presenting community-based participatory research.

In response, one audience member mentioned that while editing Social model of disability, they felt that Korean Wikipedia are lacking many documents regarding disability and users need to edit them diligently.

Wikipedia Users Meet Neurodivergent People

Following Professor Kim’s lecture, a discussion session involving Professor Kim, Wikipedia users, and neurodivergent people was held, hosted by WMKR President Jin Ju Wan.

Various discussions took place, ranging from the diagnosis of autistic people to the introduction and interpretation of research on “borderline children” and actual cases of discrimination against autistic people.

However, one audience member commented, “It was a good meeting, but there were few Q&A interactions between general users and neurodivergent people. The session was mainly conducted between Professor Kim and the audience, failing to fully reflect various perspectives between general users and neurodivergent people.”

Wikimedia Users and Neurodivergent People United by Edit-a-thon

The last session was an edit-a-thon to edit Wikipedia articles regarding neurodiversity. Although editing speeds varied widely, all participants shared their willingness to understand and support neurodiversity. One participant translated Person-first language using WikiVault. Another participant improved neurodiversity article and edited related to mental disorders. Medical model of disability and Social model of disability articles were significantly enhanced.

All of us with different identities, different editing skills, and diverse brains and nerves gathered in the event to achieve many results.

Impressions and Future Directions

Participants were generally satisfied with the lecture and hoped that such an event would be held again. Encouraged by this, President Jin stated, “We are planning to host this event as an annual event following Autistic Pride Day,” and asked for continued interest. We will continue to strive to ensure diversity is embraced in the wikimedia movement.

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