Autism is characterized by language disorders,which are closely related to deficiency in social skills and interpersonal communication. Concerning language acquisition,Chomsky argues that the reason why children can acquire their mother tongue rapidly with great uniformity is that they are born with the same initial state of human brain,which is termed universal grammar in his theory. The universal grammar is the essential part of human nature. Because of its strong explanatory adequacy,Chomsky’s theory has naturally become one of the mainstream theories in psychology of language. Though failing to take children with autism as his theoretical object,Chomsky holds that human beings differ from animals in nature even though they cannot speak due to the failure of their language organ. Therefore,a natural inference is that children with autism cannot be segregated as “others” biologically different from normal children. Differing from Chomsky, Foucault argues that there is no such thing as universal human nature. His archeological examination of the history of madness,however,reveals that autism is just a notion constructed by power/discourse and thus children with autism cannot be banished as “others” socially different from normal children. Though from different perspectives,the two great theorists both insist directly or indirectly that children with autism enjoy the same right to life and development as normal children.%语言障碍是自闭症最重要的并发表现，与社交障碍和沟通障碍紧密相关。在语言获得问题上，乔姆斯基认为儿童之所以能够在短暂的时间内以近乎统一的方式习得各自的母语，是因为人一生下来大脑中就具备被称为“普遍语法”的初始状态，而这普遍语法则是“人性”的一个核心要素；因具有强大的解释力，该理论自然成为语言心理学领域的主流理论。尽管没有将自闭症儿童的语言发展作为研究对象，但普遍语法理论认为，人即便因语言模块遭受损伤不会说话，与动物还是有着本质的不同，从而一个自然的推论就是——自闭症儿童不能当作异于人类的“他者”被排除。虽然与乔姆斯基不同，福柯不承认存在普遍的人性，但其对于疯癫史的考古学发掘告诫我们，自闭症在某种程度上是权力话语建构的结果，自闭症儿童不应该作为异于常人的“他者”被排除。虽然角度不同，但两位思想家的理论分别以间接或直接的方式主张自闭症儿童应该享有与正常儿童一样的生存与发展权利。
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