Manualism and Oralism

R

rockdrummer

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Came across this on Wickipedia and thought it was interesting.

Manualism and oralism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Manualism and oralism are two opposing philosophies regarding the education of the deaf. Manualism is the education of deaf students using sign language and oralism is the education of deaf students using spoken language. Since the beginning of formal deaf education in the 18th century, these two philosophies have been on opposing sides of a heated debate that continues to this day, although many modern deaf educational facilities attempt to integrate both approaches.


The debate
The manualists claim that the oralists neglect the psychosocial development of deaf children. In their zeal for training in articulation which requires long tedious practice, oralism leaves them with no time or energy to advance academically and socially. The result is inadequate skills and often with poor speaking ability despite the great effort invested since the oral method works best with children who have lost hearing after already having learned to speak. Manualists feel nothing is more important than giving deaf children a visual-motor language they can truly master so as to enable their intellect and humanity to develop normally and that to not respect the whole child treats them as only a broken set of ears and is tantamount to neglect or even abuse.

The oralists claim that the manualists neglect the residual hearing in deaf children and their emphasis on sign language isolates them from the wider culture and hearing family members thus serving to inculcate them in a clannish and inferior subculture that leaves them unable to succeed in the general population. While this used to be true the general change in attitude toward Deaf and Hard of Hearing people, the advent of various alternative communication devices, as well as Federal and State laws protecting their rights have given rise to greater accessibility has meant greater inclusion in all areas of American life. They also point out that only a tiny percentage of the general population can use sign language, although some studies have shown that ASL (American Sign Language) is the third most used language after English and Spanish.[citation needed] Oralists sometimes feel that nothing is more important than giving deaf children the tools to fit in with their families and society at large and so to not develop a child's ability to hear and speak to its utmost is tantamount to neglect or even abuse. However it is a great achievement that many deaf children may not accomplish due to the great degree of time and effort involved. This may change with the use of new computer speech instruction methods with visual feedback capabilities that can assist the Deaf speaker's articulations and improve their sound production with much less time and effort involved. Similarly, Speech Reading (aka lip reading) can also be done with computer programs at greater efficiency. Either methods, old and new, still require a great desire on the part of the Deaf person to achieve much ability.

The modern development of the cochlear implant has served to renew this historical debate.
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And now's a good time for the twain should meet in the middle of the road and go forth hand in hand......
 
Hopefully we don't have to wait until pigs fly out of someones butt for that to happen.
 
I never go to or trust Wikipedia because of the allowing of people to add and change information on there.

But

The posted text seems about accurate as far as the differing view and the argument.

Look at my name and you know my leanings, but, if a child/parents want to add oral too then thats ok
Like DeafDyke says in other threads on the subject - "give me the full toolbox and I'll choose"
 
ASLGAL said:
I never go to or trust Wikipedia because of the allowing of people to add and change information on there.

But

The posted text seems about accurate as far as the differing view and the argument.

Look at my name and you know my leanings, but, if a child/parents want to add oral too then thats ok
Like DeafDyke says in other threads on the subject - "give me the full toolbox and I'll choose"
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Wikipedia was recently rated a good source of accurate information. I saw that on a news program just this past week. I do trust most of what is up there. They said its as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britanica which is also a fairly reliable source. I also agree with the toolbox approach because we know not one method works for all kids.
 
rockdrummer said:
Wikipedia was recently rated a good source of accurate information. I saw that on a news program just this past week. I do trust most of what is up there. They said its as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britanica which is also a fairly reliable source. I also agree with the toolbox approach because we know not one method works for all kids.
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So why is it that those of us who provided ASL, Deaf Cultural experience, HA, AVT, and TC educational environment accused of neglecting our children's needs and taking the "easy way"?
 
Wikipedia was recently rated a good source of accurate information.
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I do trust most of what is up there
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No offense intended RockDrummer.
My observation is that a site cannot be wholey accurate if anyone, you or me or any person, can add to delete from or otherwise change the information in a section.
Since you said most then you must look at information with a skeptics eye as well :) mee too

The most profound statements I have seen/heard on the shame of forced oralism came from those interviewed for the documentary
"Through Deaf Eyes"
Overwhelmingly the adults who were forced to do oral only felt alienated, some abused, some intimidated into not seeking a means of communication that worked for them, and later in life resent their time being wasted as children and having to play catch up with ASL and other tools that had been in the box the whole time.
 
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ASLGAL said:
No offense intended RockDrummer.
My observation is that a site cannot be wholey accurate if anyone, you or me or any person, can add to delete from or otherwise change the information in a section.
Since you said most then you must look at information with a skeptics eye as well :) mee too

The most profound statements I have seen/heard on the shame of forced oralism came from those interviewed for the documentary
"Through Deaf Eyes"
Overwhelmingly the adults who were forced to do oral only felt alienated, some abused, some intimidated into not seeking a means of communication that worked for them, and later in life resent their time being wasted as children and having to play catch up with ASL and other tools that had been in the box the whole time.
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:gpost: The most valuable inforamtion we have regarding the deaf comes fromthe deaf themselves.
 
rockdrummer said:
They said its as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britanica
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Absolutely untrue. The EB has a full editorial and research team and cites legitimate references. It does not allow anyone with a pulse and an Internet connection to edit their articles. There is a much higher reliability factor with a publication like EB.

Yes, I am aware that there is a review process on Wikipedia and blatant vandalism or incorrect information is removed. It's a great source if you want to know what year a certain picture was painted, or the events leading up to World War II, and it's helpful to get an overview of subjects such as deafness, but it is absolutely unreliable as a primary source. There are two main reasons for this: not everything is always fact-checked carefully, and articles also fall prey to subtle or overt bias. (Obviously everything, including the EB, is biased in one way or another, but Wikipedia is especially subject to this problem).

No college class I have been in as an interpreter has ever allowed students to use Wikipedia as a source, and neither will I. It is, like I said, a good place to start on a subject, and the articles sometimes link to other usable references, so I don't mean to say it is not helpful, but it is not reliable.
 
Interpretrator said:
Absolutely untrue. The EB has a full editorial and research team and cites legitimate references. It does not allow anyone with a pulse and an Internet connection to edit their articles. There is a much higher reliability factor with a publication like EB.

Yes, I am aware that there is a review process on Wikipedia and blatant vandalism or incorrect information is removed. It's a great source if you want to know what year a certain picture was painted, or the events leading up to World War II, and it's helpful to get an overview of subjects such as deafness, but it is absolutely unreliable as a primary source. There are two main reasons for this: not everything is always fact-checked carefully, and articles also fall prey to subtle or overt bias. (Obviously everything, including the EB, is biased in one way or another, but Wikipedia is especially subject to this problem).

No college class I have been in as an interpreter has ever allowed students to use Wikipedia as a source, and neither will I. It is, like I said, a good place to start on a subject, and the articles sometimes link to other usable references, so I don't mean to say it is not helpful, but it is not reliable.
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True. Wikipedia is a good place to start but shouldn't be used as a source. People should always double-check the facts after looking up the information at Wikipedia by using different sources.
 
Banjo said:
True. Wikipedia is a good place to start but shouldn't be used as a source. People should always double-check the facts after looking up the information at Wikipedia by using different sources.
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Yes, source of informations are listed at bottom and if we can click "discussion" tab to see what they discuss and how they got the source and etc etc.

as for that first post, did anyone click the link and see it mention that
This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject.
WikiProject Deaf may be able to help recruit one.
If a more appropriate WikiProject or portal exists, please adjust this template accordingly.

Please help improve this article or section by expanding it.
Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion.
This article has been tagged since January 2007.
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talk page = discussion tab

See this project which this entry is part of;
Wikipedia:WikiProject Deaf - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
Banjo said:
True. Wikipedia is a good place to start but shouldn't be used as a source. People should always double-check the facts after looking up the information at Wikipedia by using different sources.
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Agreed with both you and Interpetator. I've mentioned the drawbacks of Wiki many times.
 
jillio said:
Agreed with both you and Interpetator. I've mentioned the drawbacks of Wiki many times.
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Nods. I know several debate forums who will not take Wiki as a source. It's useful but I'd go elsewhere for more specialized info.
 
jillio said:
So why is it that those of us who provided ASL, Deaf Cultural experience, HA, AVT, and TC educational environment accused of neglecting our children's needs and taking the "easy way"?
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Who ever said that. I certianly didn't. Are you talking about people on this board. If so you know you need to take that with a grain of salt.
 
ASLGAL said:
No offense intended RockDrummer.
My observation is that a site cannot be wholey accurate if anyone, you or me or any person, can add to delete from or otherwise change the information in a section.
Since you said most then you must look at information with a skeptics eye as well :) mee too

The most profound statements I have seen/heard on the shame of forced oralism came from those interviewed for the documentary
"Through Deaf Eyes"
Overwhelmingly the adults who were forced to do oral only felt alienated, some abused, some intimidated into not seeking a means of communication that worked for them, and later in life resent their time being wasted as children and having to play catch up with ASL and other tools that had been in the box the whole time.
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I agree with you and that's why I look at several sources before I come to my personal conclusions. As far as the oral teaching methods of old, I agree they were barbaric but I also believe that kind of practice doesn't exist. If I heard of anything like that happening to my child there would be a serious ass kicking followed by a law suit.
 
OK... I get what you are all saying about wikipedia but let me ask you this. In the context of the first post, do you see any thing that is not accurate?
 
jillio said:
So why is it that those of us who provided ASL, Deaf Cultural experience, HA, AVT, and TC educational environment accused of neglecting our children's needs and taking the "easy way"?
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'

There you go again.... making false accusations in order to paint a dark picture of someone...
As far as I know, nowhere has that statement been made in relation with signlanguage.... I have never read here, or elsewhere, that the choice to raise a child with sign was "neglecting the child".

And if "neglect" has been used anywhere, it most likely has been made TO parents that chose for a CI and the oral way...... "neglecting" the " true / real / natural " language of the deaf.....
That I have been accused of plenty of times..
 
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