"an open letter to the deaf community....
First and foremost, these are merely one persons own opinions and suggestions. Either take it or leave it. If you feel offended by anything I say, then you really need a wake up call.
Second, don't assume I don't know anything about deaf people. I have lived with a deaf girl for almost fve years now, and have been married to he for two years.
The main thing I want to talk about is the overwhelming lack of grammar by the majority of the deaf community. Let's take a look at a few posts on the AllDeaf forums.
u guys can make a confession..
let me start mine
i have a confession to make.... i stayed in 5 grade twice
what abt you?
this is kinda a game
ppl can learn abt urself that no one knew abt
??? I don't understand confession mean help more talk to? I am confused
The first picture is a prime example of netspeak. I don't know how lazy some people have to be to not type out an extra two letters to correctly spell 'you', but it refects badly on the person.
The second picture is a prime example of bad grammar. Yoda spoke better than this drivel.
The English written language is just that: a written language. It is nobody's first language. From the moment we are born, we slowly absorb everything around us, and the first language we learn is the spoken or signed language of our parents.
Because of this, we learn the written portion of our language a little later in life when we can comprehend what the words mean. This holds true to everyone, deaf or not.
As an adult there is no excuse for having bad grammar and/or spelling. Nobody's grammer is perfect but making something simple to write turn out to be incomprehensible to someone else is just plain lazy.
As an adult you have ample opportunity to learn and improve, but some choose to not do so for one reason or another.
I know of a couple in Dover, Delaware by the names of Amy and Daniel who simply refuse to learn. The woemn is cearly and adult and has yet to take the GED. Her spelling and grammer are so atrocious that success on the test is nigh-impossible.
But considering that they are jobless drug-addicts who prefer to suckle on the government teat rather than expand their ambition, I do not beleive that they will make it very far in this world.
I implore you, deaf community, to pick up an English study guide and LEARN.
Thank you for your time.