Julia loves singing and playing games - and she has autism. The muppet character has joined the squad of "Sesame Street." The popular children's television show is known for its inclusive approach.
The creators of "Sesame Street" announced Sunday that the popular show would introduce a muppet named Julia who has autism.
The green-eyed, red-haired character was developed during years of consultation with families, organizations and experts within the autism community, Jeanette Betancourt, Sesame Workshop's senior vice president of US Social Impact said.
"We wanted to promote a better understanding and reduce the stigma often found around these children. We're modeling the way both children and adults can look at autism from a strength-based perspective: finding things that all children share," she said.
Everyday situations
An example is in the first episode featuring Julia. She is having fun with her friends Abby and Elmo when Big Bird walks in. He wants to be Julia's new friend, but she ignores him. He thinks she doesn't like him, until Abby informs him "she does things just a little differently, in a Julia sort of way."
Later, the children are playing a game of tag and Julia becomes distressed when a siren wails, covering her ears.
"She needs to take a break," explains Big Bird's human friend Alan calmly. Soon all is well and the group starts playing again.
Passionate puppeteer
The puppeteer who plays Julia, Stacey Gordon, has a son with autism and has worked as a therapist to children on the autism spectrum.
"The 'Meet Julia' episode is something that I wish my son's friends had been able to see when they were small," Gordon said. "I remember him having meltdowns and his classmates not understanding how to react."
Autism Pride Day
June 18 is Autism Pride Day. People on the autism spectrum are affected in their social interactions and cognitive abilities to varying degrees. DW introduces you to some well-known examples.
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Albert Einstein
The physicist and maths genius was thought to have Asperger's Syndrome, a type of autism. People with Asperger's often focus obsessively on a complex topic and have trouble with social relationships. According to the BBC, Einstein was a loner as a child and repeated sentences obsessively. He was also very well versed in a highly complex topic - Einstein famously developed the theory of relativity.
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
The wunderkind's gifts to learn instruments incredibly quickly, compose music by the age of five and hear melodies while writing them have some experts believe Mozart was autistic. Supporters of this theory also point to Mozart's oversensitive hearing and his need to constantly move his hands and feet. Other researchers, however, say there isn't sufficient evidence for this theory.
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Temple Grandin
She only started speaking at age four, but went on to become a sought-after expert for humane livestock handling: Temple Grandin uses her detailed visual memory and her own hypersensitivity to noise to better understand cattle and other animals. This has allowed her to develop thoughtful and humane animal-handling equipment. Grandin has also given many lectures about living with autism.
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Dan Aykroyd
The Canadian actor famous for his starring roles in movies like "The Blues Brothers" revealed in 2013 that he was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome in the 1980s. Aykroyd credited his Asperger's with being responsible for "Ghostbusters," his biggest hit: "One of my symptoms included my obsession with ghosts and law enforcement," he told the Daily Mail.
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Kim Peek
You may never have heard the name Kim Peek, but you're likely to know the movie he inspired: "Rain Man." The 1980s classic deals with the complicated relationship between Charlie Babbitt and his autistic brother Raymond, modeled after Peek and played by Dustin Hoffman. Peek, who died in 2009, was a so-called savant. He could recall the contents of more than 12,000 books.
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Andy Warhol
A soup can repeated over and over again on a canvas - one of Warhol's most famous paintings could be a sign that the artist was autistic. 'I would say, from the study I have seen, that Warhol almost certainly had Asperger's syndrome,' autism expert Judith Gould said. She pointed to his reluctance to speak too many words and his obsession with the uniformity of consumer goods as further clues.
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Sheldon Cooper
Jim Parsons plays physicist Dr. Sheldon Cooper in "The Big Bang Theory," one of the most-watched sitcoms in the US. It's never stated that Sheldon is on the autism spectrum, but Parsons said he believed Sheldon has Asperger's, and many fans agree. Sheldon is a genius in his field, but doesn't understand sarcasm. He has a strict weekly dining plan and can only sit in one specific spot on his couch.
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"Sesame Street" writer Christine Ferraro told "60 Minutes" she was keen for Julia to become a major character on the show.
"I would love her to be not Julia, the kid on 'Sesame Street' who has autism," she added. "I would like her to be just Julia."
Following funding struggles, Sesame Workshop in 2015 announced a five-year deal under which first-run episodes of "Sesame Street" would move to commercial premium broadcaster HBO and be shown on member stations of public broadcaster PBS nine months later.
"Sesame Street" has a large international following along with characters specific to the more than 150 different countries it airs in.
Julia has already appeared in online and printed illustrations as part of an initiative by Sesame Workshop called "Sesame Street and Autism: See Amazing in All Children." She is due to make her televised debut in April.