Linguistics 1 / Anthropology 104: Fall 2004
American Sign Language
Learning and using Sign Language will be pretty easy to do because there are so many books and web sites available that teaches it to anyone who wants to learn.
In life, people usually take things for granted like the ability to speak and hear. For the last few weeks I have been hanging out with my friend named XXXX. Until I really got to know her, I know that I sure took the ability to listen for granted. I have always seen myself as a healthy individual and my parents have always been very supportive by telling me that I'm pretty smart. So why wouldn't I take those things for granted? Along comes XXXX who is deaf and needs to communicate with her friends and family by using sign language. As a bird sits in a tree near my window, I have no problem hearing it sing. She has been deaf since early childhood and probably will never really hear any of the things that we hear every day. A plane flying by or a car zooming past will never make her turn her head. For XXXX, life is very different. This term paper is a summary of my couple of weeks of hanging out with her. I wrote the term paper with a new appreciation for what life would be like if I couldn't hear. I used to walk around town with my CD player blaring into my headset but from now on I think I will turn it down a bit. But, during our time together I did find out that being deaf does have both good and bad things about it. This repot will try to share some of those things. I also tried to give some of my opinions about the whole situation because I have honestly learned a lot of new things. For example, it is pretty hard to use sign language when you think like a person who hears and it gets a little easier when you change your way of thinking.
Observations
My first observation when I started this project was that when either a child or an adult is deaf, more than just that person is affected. For example, when I first visited XXXX, I saw the yellow triangle shaped sign on her street that said: 'Slow Down -- deaf child in area.' I bet I saw that sign a hundred times but never thought about it or how important it was. When a child is deaf or even hard of hearing, it affects the family and the immediate community. Each has to take a number of things into consideration.
Some of these things include how and where a deaf child is supposed to play, the day-to-day living of the deaf child including the schools and where to work in the future, how to discipline a deaf child, learning to communicate with that child through sign language or special equipment and most of all, coming to terms with the fact that the child is deaf. XXXX is lucky because she has a family that is supportive and well off enough financially to support the handicap of deafness. You also can't take for granted that she lives in a nice and safe community where her neighbors are friendly, helpful and supportive.
American Sign Language
XXXX uses sign language to communicate with her friends and family. I used to think that pro and college football teams that waggled in plays from the sideline using signs was pretty amazing until I watched a full conversation with XXXX and her family. There are various types of sign language just like there are accents in the English language. XXXX uses the American Sign Language style and she signs with her mother and father and little brother. American Sign Language is pretty complex. The language is a 'visual-spatial' language that is used mainly in the United States and English-speaking Canada. The language is a linguistically complete and natural language.
I have to be honest, when I started this project as you can see from my hypothesis, I thought that I would just go online and start signing that day. XXXX and her family are fun to watch using sign because they are communicating at a speed that is too wild. I thought I would be talking to her in sign language throughout the time we were going to spend together but on my first night online I saw that this was not going to be as easy as I thought.
When I realized that a deaf child could sing using sign language I figured that I would use that approach. I thought I would just learn some...
I have seen that many teachers just understand what they are teaching themselves. If the student is have looking confused, they never bother asking them. I think the student should be confident enough to give a quick reply. I believe the student should be relaxed with the teacher and free to say anything he/she desires. I would say that it is the tutors fault if a student is like
This program will be offered in the Leadership Development Seminar in which students are offering challenging experiences as well as the areas of higher-level academic pursuits which includes a historical journey through the history of deafness related individuals. Merrill Lynch has also developed a program targeting deaf students, which was released in a news announcement earlier this month of March 2005. The Merrill Lynch Entrepreneur Leadership Program is offering a
American Sign Language and Gallaudet Gallaudet University is a college designed for the education of the deaf and hard of hearing. All of the programs are designed for the advancement of the deaf community. The majority of students and faculty are themselves deaf or hard of hearing, although a limited number of students without these disabilities are allowed into the school each year. The university began in 1857 when the 34th Congress
sign language in public settings for people who are deaf. Writing notes as a way to communicate with people who are deaf is convenient, for people with normal hearing, and recommended, by people with normal hearing. In the world of hearing people, recommendations for using note writing as a way to communicate with people who are deaf is common. Communication at work. Employers are advised to supplement their communication with employees
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There is "evidence that deaf children benefit from early exposure to sign language points to the need for in-depth sign language training for parents and other caregivers, with special attention to underserved populations such as those in rural areas," (Marschuck 2001 p 9). Parents should not rely on external schools at later developmental stages, when the damage to the child's cognitive and linguistic abilities could have already been done. Chomsky's
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