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Have you
ever watched one of those viral videos
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where a baby hears their parents
for the first time
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after getting a cochlear implant
and thought, "Aw, so adorable!"
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Well, what if I told you that the history
leading up to
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that moment isn't quite so cute?
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In videos like these, doctors place
an electronic device near a Deaf person's
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ear that sends auditory
signals to the brain similar to hearing.
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The hope behind these implants
is that they'll allow the Deaf person
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to participate
fully in the mainstream hearing world.
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But many Deaf advocates
say that this process is trying to fix
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something that just isn't broken.
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Instead,
they want us to recognize that Deaf people
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already have a rich linguistic culture
and community of sign language users
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with just as much validity
as any other language.
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And that signing needs less attempts
at correction and more of our attention.
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I'm Dr. Erica Brozovsky, and this is Otherwords.
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Otherwords.
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I interviewed Roberta Cordano,
president of Gallaudet University,
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to discuss what many of us misunderstand
about sign language.
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I would say the biggest misperception
is the power
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and importance of American Sign Language
or sign language in general.
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Just visual learning. Visual language.
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I think too many people,
especially in health care,
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health care professionals,
really completely misunderstand
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how important visual language is for brain
development,
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how important and equivalent
ASL is to English.
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When we try to describe what language is,
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a lot of people think about the shapes
we make with our mouths when we speak
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or the sounds we hear
or even the words we read.
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But gestures and facial expressions
are also parts of language.
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Every human being,
wherever you are in the world,
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already has about 200 gestures
that are innate to them as human beings.
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The brain already knows how to produce
these gestures.
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But the problem is instead that we have
had gesturing scolded out of us.
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I mean, think about it, right?
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If you think about someone pointing?
You're always told not to point!
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That it's not polite. Right?
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But imagine how efficient it is:
if I point in one direction.
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You look to where I pointed.
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I don't have to say a single word.
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Sign languages are produced with hand
movements, head
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movements and facial expressions
rather than sounds.
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They have all the same structural
characteristics that spoken languages do.
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They have complex vocabulary,
including regional variations and slang
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and grammatical rules,
where things like the speed,
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direction and position of a sign
can change its meaning.
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And there's just as much vibrance and
variety in sign languages as spoken ones.
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There are more than 150 different
sign languages used around the world
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that are distinct from each other and
the spoken languages in the same places.
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The only people in the world
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who are still creating language--not just words, but actual languages--
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The only people who are still creating
languages in the world are Deaf people.
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Spoken languages have been static
for the last 500 years.
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As I understand it,
the last couple of hundred years, there's
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no new spoken
languages being developed anywhere.
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But that's not true for sign language.
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You know, where
there are Deaf people coming together,
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they create new sign languages
to communicate.
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I mean, that's incredible.
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Sign language seems pretty cool, right?
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So why don't more of us sign?
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That's where we get into
some pretty painful history.
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Until the early 1800s,
most Deaf people born in the U.S.
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didn't have access to education
that could meet their needs.
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But in 1816, a collaboration
between French educators and American
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advocates raised a bunch of money
and established a school for the Deaf,
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where students could learn and communicate
using signs instead of speech.
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Finally, these students had access
to education, but even more importantly,
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to a Deaf community
where they could sign with each other.
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The French sign language
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these teachers brought started to combine with
the signs that students made up at home
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or in their own communities
to create American Sign Language or ASL.
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But not everybody liked
this new model of education.
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Some academic hotshots
like Alexander Graham Bell--
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Yes, that Alexander Graham Bell--
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argued that Deaf people,
including his own Deaf mother and wife,
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should try to integrate into mainstream
speaking culture as best they could.
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So in 1880, Bell and 164 other educators--
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(only one of them Deaf)
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met at a conference to create recommendations
for Deaf education in the U.S.
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and Europe.
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They believed that sign language
was a lesser imitation of spoken language
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and that Deaf kids
shouldn't be taught to sign in schools.
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Instead,
they created a system called Oralism,
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where Deaf children were expected to hear
by lip reading
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and speak by imitating the mouth
shapes of hearing people.
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That conference was catastrophic
for the Deaf community.
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It ended most sign language
instruction in schools until the 1960s.
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That's almost 100 years where many Deaf
people had little to no access
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to sign language education, or the ability
to form communities with fellow signers.
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And it was only in 2013
that there was an apology
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issued to the Deaf community
for the Milan Conference,
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the declaration that spoke to banning
sign language back in the 1880s.
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That apology to the Deaf community
that came in 2013 was one
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that my mother was still alive to see,
and my mother suffered because of that
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decree during that period of time.
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And my mother said, you know,
I finally have lived to see this apology
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that happened in her lifetime,
and it meant a lot to her.
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The problem is,
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you can't just treat someone like they're
not Deaf and expect them to blend in.
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Even the most skilled lip readers report
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that they can only pick up
about a third of conversations.
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So that means that most Deaf
people denied access to sign
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language are being denied access
to language, period.
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And that can have some serious
consequences for brain development.
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The most important time
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to expose someone to language, for them
to develop fluency, and for their brain
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to be developed,
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you know, the language
to be actually mapped to the language
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mapping center of the brain is between
the ages of birth and five.
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So we know that any human being
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who wants to acquire a language, between
that window is the best opportunity
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for them to be able to map that language
to the right area of the brain.
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Research has shown
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that children who acquire language late,
whether signed or spoken,
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are less likely to use the important
language centers of the brain.
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Instead, they process language
in the visual or memory centers,
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a less efficient process that can still
allow for a large vocabulary
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but might inhibit a natural grasp
of the language's grammar.
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Every child who is Deaf or hard of hearing
is at high risk
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of experiencing language
delay, language deprivation.
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And it’s not because the child's
brain has a limited capacity,
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but rather it's more about the fact
that they've not been able to have access
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to information in a stress-free environment
where they can just learn freely.
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When I was younger,
I was the only Deaf person in the class
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and I had to sit there
and every minute of that class,
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I had to watch to make sure I understood
what was being said by the instructor.
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Then I had to figure out
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what was the meaning of the message
that was being shared in spoken language.
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And then I had to think about,
Well, what is it that I just learned?
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And then I have to be ready to be called
on by the teacher at any point in time.
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So I was doing four separate functions
every minute of every single day,
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all day long,
and that's absolutely exhausting.
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Even newer technology
like hearing aids or cochlear implants
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don't work for all
or even most Deaf people.
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A majority of cochlear implant recipients
still cannot pick up
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spoken language at a level comparable
to a hearing person.
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Of course, we know
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there are many examples of where people
who are raised, what we call orally,
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meaning that they have hearing aids
or cochlear implants.
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There are many Deaf
and hard of hearing people
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who are very successful going that route
and they thrive in their careers.
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I mean, in no way am I criticizing
that approach and that lifestyle.
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I think that's just wonderful.
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And again,
I'm not blaming the doctors here
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because we also realize that as well
that in their doctor kit
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that they bring to the table,
they're not given anything that speaks to
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a prescription for ASL. Right?
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That's not in their tool kit.
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Right. Insurances
pay for cochlear implants.
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They pay for hearing aids, but they sure
don't pay for language support.
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What I'm trying to do is to get people
to realize that there's a false choice
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that we're setting up here,
that you have to choose one way
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of communicating
or the other. Both are needed.
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Both are beneficial.
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So why not do both?
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Why not give the child everything
to that child's disposal, to have to use
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whatever they need and see whatever
best suits them and what they pick up.
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Depriving a Deaf child of sign language
in hopes they'll learn
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spoken language puts them at a high risk
for having difficulty
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with any language later in life.
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But the reverse is also true.
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Learning to sign from birth,
whether alone or alongside
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spoken language,
has some major cognitive benefits.
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If you saw our video on bilingualism,
you'll remember that bilingual kids
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grow up with cognitive advantages
in memory and attention.
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The same holds true for kids
who learn both ASL and English,
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but because sign language uses
additional areas of the brain,
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people who speak and sign get a boost
in visual and spatial processes too,
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like giving directions
or remembering faces.
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And that's true for people who are hearing
or Deaf.
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In fact, research will show that learning
sign language for all babies,
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Deaf and hearing, will impact
their brain in such a way
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that it will allow for further development
of abstract thinking.
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Pattern recognition is enhanced.
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There's loads of benefits that visual
language and visual learning provide.
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It allows your brain to thrive in
different ways that otherwise it couldn't.
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I mean, it's just amazing what can happen
when you get exposed to a spoken language
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and a visual language.
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And that's why I encourage having both.
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So even though for hundreds of years,
society
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thought that Deaf people
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would miss out on language and culture
if they learned to sign,
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this whole time, it's non signers
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who've been missing out
on an entire dimension of language
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and on a vibrant community
of Deaf people who use it.
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So what I recognize is,
is that we have been so busy
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trying to fix Deaf babies or Deaf
hard of hearing babies
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by putting technologies on them
and trying to fix them
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so that they'll be hearing
and be able to access spoken language
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that we've completely missed out
on what those Deaf babies have
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to offer the entire world:
a lifetime experience of hearing loss.
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And I think we've really got it wrong.
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The babies are our teachers
in this process.
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They are teaching us how to live
with the beauty of a visual language,
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how to live in a world full of visual
images and visual communication.
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You know, it's just a way of being
that is so beneficial to everyone,
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if you learn sign language
and use sign language.
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The more of us that join
the signing community,
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the more we can experience broader
and more complex ways of thinking
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and more inclusive ways
of communicating with each other.
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