What It Is Like To Be Deaf From Birth Analysis

After reading Deaf Again, I can imagine some points about deaf people’ lives. It is really hard when someone tries to fit into something but it is not for he or she. I realize that the words “Never mind,” or “It is not important” can hurt someone. Moreover, I extremely admire the author, Mark Drolsbaugh, and other Deaf people because they are very patient and they are not easy feel down like hearing people.

Chapter 2 delves into the lives of families with deaf children. It also goes into the genealogy of the Deaf community. It is a common factor that Deaf parents would prefer having a Deaf child, simply because having a hearing child would be more complicated for them. This does not mean that they would love their hearing children any less, The birth of a Deaf baby secures that the legacy of more Deaf children is possible. They are more than happy to celebrate when this kind of news is brought their way.

The book, Deaf Again, written by Mark Drolsbaugh, is an autobiography telling his life story which starts with a young boy growing up who goes through the process of losing his hearing and then, as he gets older, he struggles with trying to fit in as a normal child. When Mark was very young, he could hear fairly well then gradually he went hard of hearing until he eventually went completely deaf. Even though he had two deaf parents, the doctors advised speech therapy and hearing aids because they did not understand Deaf Culture and they thought that Mark would be a lot happier if he could hang on to his hearing persona. Throughout the rest of the book, Mark goes through a lot of stages of trying to fit in with everyone and eventually

The book “Deaf Again” is unique because the author has been on both sides of the spectrum. He had been hearing for some time and now is Deaf. He shows each viewpoint and doesn’t make it just for hearing or just for the Deaf. This author is also unique in showing his feelings for both hearing and also being Deaf.

Deaf Again is an autobiography written by Mark Drolsbaugh. In this book he begins at his birth, goes on to explain what it was like to lose his hearing, and details how this impacted and affected his life. Around the time Mark was in first grade, he began to realize that he was losing his hearing when he began having difficulty hearing some of his fellow students. His hearing continued to deteriorate until he was left completely deaf. This was very tough for Mark, because even though his parents were both deaf, they encouraged him to do his best to continue to be a hearing person. His parents believed that he would be happiest if he could fit in with all the hearing people, but didn’t understand that he could not truly be himself if he was

Deaf Like Me is a story compiled together by Thomas and James Spradley. It is a compelling story about two hearing+ parents struggling to cope with their daughters overwhelming deafness. This powerful story expresses with simplicity the love, hope, and anxieties of all hearing parents of deaf children. In the epilogue, Lynn Spradley, herself, now a teenager thinks back about different times in her life growing up deaf. She reflects upon her education, her struggle to communicate, and the discovery that she was the inspiration and the main focus of her father's and uncle's book collaboration. Deaf Like Me is a

According to the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders, about two to three children out of every 1,000 are born with a detectable level of hearing impairment in the United States. Without hearing, children miss out on the acoustic correlates of the physical world, such as car horns and footsteps. Children are also limited in their exposure to patterned complexities in music and spoken word. These hard of hearing and deaf students grow and develop in unique ways compared to their hearing peers because of the stimulus they do not have. Researchers have focused on how communication methods for hard of hearing and deaf children affect their development in the physical, social-emotional, cognitive and communicative

Mark Drolsbaugh’s Deaf Again book gives a detailed account of his experience with becoming deaf in both a hearing and deaf world. It includes the awkwardness and un-comfortability he felt in hearing environments, within is personal family dynamic and in deaf safe havens where he learned to adjust, and grow for the betterment of him learning ASL and in general, becoming emerged within Deaf culture. Drolsbaugh starts the book off by introducing how life for deaf people, even when giving birth, can be a struggle (due to society not being well informed on how to effectively communicate and treat Deaf individuals). Drolsbaugh’s mother, Sherry, wasn’t properly given epidural while giving birth to him, and as she made noises to best express that something was wrong, the nurse brushed it off. Once Mark was born, and Sherry got up the needle wasn’t in her back but on the bed. Looking at how communication issues can lead to negative results, throughout the rest of the book Drolsbaugh sheds light on this phenomenon, specifically focusing on the educational environment and the interactions between and among hearing and deaf communities.

The Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHOH) are understudied population and disproportionately impacted by cardiovascular diseases (CVD) due communication barriers (Mckee, Mckee, Winters, Sutter, & Pearson, 2014; McKee & Paasche-Orlow, 2012; Strong & Prinz, 1997). In considering the link between communication barriers and CVD attribute to insufficient English proficiency, inability to comprehend physicians’ spoken and written instructions, and inability to access community-based health outreach education programs in which all these surface factors increases the chance of DHOH developing CVD (McKee et al., 2011; Margellos-Anast, Estarziau, & Kaufman, 2006). The barriers that restrict access to health information suggest that

The book, Deaf Again, written by Mark Drolsbaugh, is an autobiography telling his life story which starts with a young boy growing up who goes through the process of losing his hearing and then, as he gets older, he struggles with trying to fit in as a normal child. When Mark was very young, he could hear fairly well then gradually he went hard of hearing until he eventually went completely deaf. Even though he had two deaf parents, the doctors advised speech therapy and hearing aids because they did not understand Deaf Culture and they thought that Mark would be a lot happier if he could hang on to his hearing persona. Throughout the rest of the book, Mark goes through a lot of stages of trying to fit in

CI’s were manufactured in order to create ease of function in day to day lives of deaf people but has conjured up ethical and social issues amongst specific cultures. Across different cultures there are opposing and parallel beliefs regarding cochlear implants and the benefits and harms regarding the process of implanting one. Many deaf communities within western cultures such as America and Australia view CI’s as unnecessary and offensive towards deaf culture. According to a majority of cultures, receiving CI’s is seen as inappropriate and takes away a person’s identity. Heather Artinian, in the annual TED conference who is a deaf person who wears cochlear implants explained that receiving cochlear implants places the individual between two identities, neither deaf nor hearing. This is because once receiving her cochlear implants, the deaf community within her western culture no longer perceives her as a deaf person because, following receiving the implants, she was able to hear sounds and communicate in ways which deaf people who hadn’t received the implants could not. She too described that she was also not part of the hearing culture as she was not considered as a hearing individual due to being born deaf and despite receiving the CI’s, is still regarded as deaf opposed to as a

In the same way that no two individuals are alike, nor are any two families with deaf or hard of hearing members. Due to the various ways that hearing loss can occur, the occurrence of hearing loss in any one family can vary. There are families with deaf parents and hearing children. There are families with deaf parents and deaf children. There are families who have never encountered a deaf or hearing impaired person that suddenly have a child who is deaf or hard of hearing. Hearing impairment affects different families in different ways. Many believe that families where both parents and the children are deaf or hard of hearing have an advantage, because the parents are already a part of the deaf culture and thus their children are born into the community. Meanwhile, hearing parents who birth a deaf or hearing impaired child have to adjust to a new way of relating to and communicating with not only their child, but also with those involved in the rearing of that child. Fortunately for these parents, organizations like the Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing exist to provide these families with resources, funds, and education to help them tread on unfamiliar territory. These kinds of organizations connect all families who have members with the disability, and no matter the family dynamic, there are resources for them to take advantage of, including legal aid. As seen in the short clip from the Center for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, early childhood, around the time of

Recently in the United States, there has been a drive at both the state and national level to provide universal screening for newborns to detect hearing loss. Although the idea of a universal screening in newborns is a new phenomenon, research has examined the impact of early intervention and screening for children with hearing loss. “Most professionals in the field feel strongly that early identification of hearing loss and early implementation of intervention enhances the child’s social, communicative, and academic development” (Calderon, 1998, p. 54). With that, the two studies used participants in the same early intervention program and mainly focused on the importance of the age of enrollment. Furthermore, the age of enrollment

“Mother Father Deaf: Living Between Sound and Silence” by Paul Preston, portrays interviews with over 150 individuals, who are all hearing children of deaf parents. Being that Preston is a child of deaf parents, himself, it made it a lot easier for the informants to fully open up to him. He understands where they are coming from and is relatable for them. One of their biggest frustrations is having to explain deafness- in terms of their parents, as well as themselves, to people who don’t understand the culture. One interviewee even mentioned, “I wasn’t going to do the interview because I always get asked so many dumb questions. It’s a lot better knowing that you understand, that I don’t have to explain everything” (Preston, 46). The common bond between Preston and them helped gained a sense of trust between each other.

In this society, people try to understand other types of cultures and groups, however, that does not always happen. There are people who have many misconceptions and others that just make stereotypes about a group. People are being misjudged because of all the stereotypes being made. Misconceptions and stereotypes are two different terms. However, both are direct to a certain group. Every person sees a group differently, that is why there are many stereotypes and misconceptions. Men and women have different points of view, resulting in different kinds of stereotypes. Deaf people are perceived as people who need to get “fixed”, who are not capable of anything, and who are freaks.