jumz2003

First- I am not deaf myself but a friend of mine with whom I've been writing for about a week now is and the corespondence with her is really interesting and we are good friends now. The problem is that her writing isn't normal- wrong words, wrong place in the sentence, missed words and so on...("my sister of mine is sick-throat,head,not well"; "I going back there..."; "Boy are liars" and other stuff like that). I understand what she's trying to say but several times things went really awkward and we couldn't define what the other was trying to say. I really want to understand her properly but I'm embarrassed that I don't know much for her problem. Is the wrong writing of hers a consequence of her deafness ( I know that deaf people are usually writing very properly)? She's smart- studying in university and working at the same time. So does anyone of you knows why is she writing like that?

Deafness

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posts from hell

It's definitely not because of her deafness.

Otherwise I would be writing like her.

shel90

I concur....I am deaf and I dont write like that.

It must be another reason.

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AlleyCat

It's interesting how conveniently it is forgotten that many hearing people have writing issues. I suppose that means that English wasn't their first language. So not true, because I'm surrounded by many in my real life where said writing issues are prevalent, and guess what? English IS their first language.

faire_jour

Absolutely true. That is why 1st language vs 2nd language is not the only reason for a lack of fluency in writing.

AlleyCat

You are failing to see my point. My point was that there are hearing people who have writing issues, and it's clearly not caused by deafness, or which language is their first language. You cannot tell us that because we are deaf, all of a sudden deafness does apply.

Calvin

Mod note:

I've decided to give this thread another chance, so from now on... please debate in cordial manner and respect one another as well as deaf culture. If this thread can not stay civil again, this thread will stay locked indefinitely.

Thanks.

deafgal001

I was told I write backward too from an internet friend ... actually she was asking a honest question because she noticed I and few other people who are born deaf seem to have a backward way of writing (I guess it is awkward for her auditory mind)... and I'm not even ASL deaf, I never had any sign language (SEE/CUED/PSE...NONE of those, I was raise to speechread)

I'm having a very difficult time finding out what wrong with the second or third sentence examples.

It's the parents as it is their job to make sure they have accessible language in the first place before they start school so they don't waste their time learning a language that they don't have in preschool or kindergarten ... Instead, they could spend more time learning how to write.

Daredevel7

"I going back there" should be "I am going back there."
"Boy are liars" should be "Boys are liars." if that helps deafgal.

I am not sure why a couple of people are claiming that it is not a deaf thing. Is it me or isn't it blatantly obvious? Yes I know hearing people have grammar mistakes too but their mistakes are drastically different than those typical of the deaf. Writing mistakes isn't a deaf thing (just as writing mistakes isn't a hearing thing) but to me those kind of mistakes is definitely a deaf thing. Phonetically mispelling words is definitely a hearing thing.

deafgal001

I assume that she just forgot to add those. I thought there was something wrong with the word order. Of course, in some cases, I have no idea where to add my "s" - like bob says "hi" or should it be "bob say hi"?

souggy

Wirelessly posted

I think they're inferring it's an education issue, not actual ability.

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AlleyCat

Daredevel, No. It is not blatantly obvious that it is a deaf thing. It is blatantly obvious it is an educational and family issue. There are scads of us here on this forum that have been deaf since birth, and do we write poorly? Do I? Does PFH? Does Shel? No. There are plenty of hearing people (maybe you haven't been around any or enough that have poor writing skills) of all ages, races, disabilities who do not write well. Is it because of their race, age, disability? No. It's a grasp of the language and that comes from how it was learned - in school and at home. It's insulting to assume that just because we are deaf that we are likely to have poor writing skills.

posts from hell

That.

BecLak

I second that. Good post, Alleycat

Frisky Feline

I concur with alleycat.

rockin'robin

I have met many, many hearing and deaf with very poor writing/spelling skills. So, No, it isn't a "deaf thing". I believe it's lack of education.

As for hearing, some can "speak" what they want/need to say, but cannot spell/write it....and for some deaf, they can sign what they need/want to say, but cannot get it in correct word order.

I do believe that it why many deafies don't post on the Forums because of their poor English......and as for the hearies, whenever they had to "write" something down for me, and could not spell the words, they would become all "flustered" and ignore me. So....before any Hearie who assumes or thinks the deafies are dumb...let them come to AD!...They would get an education right off the bat! And question their own intellect!

deafskeptic

And I third it!

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Jiro

I see what you're saying. I'm inclined to agree with you that there is a certain grammatical hint that points to deaf person but there is other grammatical hint that points to something else such as a foreigner from certain country because of its different grammatical structure (like... Nigerian scammer).

There are actually many hearies who are quite intelligent but illiterate to a certain degree and perhaps write much worse than deaf people. Guess who? ................ Dyslexic people

so your argument doesn't really make much sense since you and I are deaf so why aren't we writing like them? This is the proper reason - anybody who has bad writing is because they had a bad education early on. Many children who are born deaf tend to have something else such as learning disability, dyslexia, ADD, etc. but unfortunately - it went unnoticed until it was too late. That's why they were mistreated as "deaf and dumb".

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Beowulf

This is a pretty sensitive subject and care must be taken not to hurt people's feelings. Saying that it is because of a lack of education would be an affront to those who tried their best in school, and saying it is from a lack of parenting offends others who love their parents, and saying it is a combination of both makes some feel like utter failures. I want it to be known that I am ONLY expressing my OWN opinion when I say that it is a combination of factors that culminate into the final result. Yeah, it is not saying much, but hey, I don't want to piss off people in here.

Jiro

sensitive subject.... indeed it is... because it's tied with traumatic childhood experience...

it could be several different reasons but feel free to correct me. IMO - for many deaf people's bad writing - I believe it is because of bad education in their youth. It could be because they had undiagnosed problem (learning disability, dyslexia, ADD, etc.) that was hampering their attempt to learn writing. or it could be because they had awful (or... abusive) teacher or parents that discouraged them from learning to write. or it could be because they were at orphan/foster/state house so they never had proper guidance.

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Beowulf

That is what I said, except I left out the part about having undiagnosed problems. You just paraphrased my statements, so we are on the same page, lol.

Jiro

despite of your past - you came out just fine! Here's free for you. It's to make you less intimidating to audists/AG Bell/Clarke School who believe "ASL-first equals shitty writing"

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KristinaB

As for me and my family, my daughter has struggled and struggled, but she still has poor writing skills. It's not a lack of education, or a lack of family involvement. We've been told, it's learning disabilities and problems with brain function. I don't really take offense and she's learned to let rude or snide comments just "roll off like water on a duck's back". Now, on the flip side, my son has writing skills like that of a very intelligent and highly learned college student. Not sure where he got that, but his creativity just makes me wish I was like that. His grammar is mostly flawless and an English Professor was astonished that he was only 13 when he wrote this one essay on the Civil War. I'll have to unpack it again sometime. We framed it and the comments.

deafgal001

I'm not sure if ADD is the case either because there are a few people here who has it and write pretty good. But it is very possible that most school ignored the problem because deaf education is still "experimenting" with trying to improve the 4th grade level that they associate with deafness using speech/hearing/Manual Coded English. according to overall statistic, it is still stuck on that level no matter what method they used... they need to stop experimenting communication, stabilize a language for the deaf so they can work from there and be able to distinish deaf people with learning disabilities.

and yes, parents can have alot of influence on their deaf child's language, but they can be great parents but have a child who is undiagnosed with learning disability.

souggy

Wirelessly posted

ADD... I think is a personality quirk that somehow got interpreted as a disorder in a society that focuses on organizations and order; because if it's estimated 30-40% of the population have ADD... it's not really a disorder. Either way, ADD doesn't seem to have much impact on language development.

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Jiro

learning English is a lot of work and it's tedious. Person with ADD may or may not struggle with it but it is possible that ADD can contribute to problem, right?

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deafgal001

no, The people I know have ADD or ADHD and NONE of them have a writing issue (in fact some of them write TOO much) . Just distraction issues.

they don't even have a spelling issue.

Jiro

so you're saying it is not possible that ADD contributes to writing problem even to some people?

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deafgal001

If it is true, I would see it, but I haven't.

even several of my good friends (hearing friends,,, so this is not about deafness) told me they were diagnosed with ADD or ADHD, and they write alot to me. I have not seen a single writing issue from them. One of them never been on ritalin or any medication (her parents believe it is just a personality quirk as well) and she writes just fine.

I think ADD is like deafness... the real issue is hidden under deafness or ADD

Beowulf

I'm sure it does. My wife (deceased ten years now) had ADD as well as schizophrenia and extreme anxiety and her writing was atrocious and she was raised by foster families. However, I could still communicate with her via TDD, and I did not think any less of her for it. She had a rough time in school, of course, and I did not blame her. ADD surely interferes with studies, seems a no-brainer.