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Bristol's Centre for Deaf People | Bristol News | This is Bristol
All eyes are down at the bingo session. Large red numbers are flashing on a screen – but there is no caller shouting "two fat ladies, 88" or "unlucky for some, 13".
Instead, there is silence. Then someone stands up and waves.
One of the players in the weekly bingo game at the Centre for Deaf People in Bristol's King Square has got a full house.
The weekly bingo at the 50+ Club is one of the many social activities provided at the centre for members, who range from schoolchildren to pensioners.
The collection of football pennants hanging around the bar testify to the centre's active football club.
There is also a snooker club, a well-attended youth club, a drama and film club, and a skittles club. There is even a church where all services are in sign language. All are a lifeline for people whose deafness makes it difficult to socialise in the hearing world
"Being deaf or hard of hearing can also mean being isolated," explains chief executive John Maslen.
The centre provides an array of equipment, in partnership with Bristol City Council, to make life easier for people who are deaf or hard of hearing. These include amplified telephones and text telephones, portable door bells, and personal listening systems to amplify the sound from television, radio, and conversation.
Mr Maslen says: "It's very different to 125 years ago when the Reverend Mayers, the minister at City Road Baptist Church, founded what was then the Bristol Institute for the Deaf and Dumb.
"He went out into the gas-lit streets and met people with no voices and no hearing and worked amongst them, and even took them home to his wife to get them washed.
"He was a deeply Christian man, and I think he had a passion for people. I think even today people need to have a passion to understand deaf people and to accept them as equals, not as subordinates.
"My own parents had hearing difficulties, which made their lives difficult. That's why I've got the passion."
Yet even with all the benefits of modern technology, and the social opportunities and counselling provided at the Centre for Deaf People, it can still be hard for those born deaf, or those who have become deaf, to cope with life in the hearing world.
Lip reading tutor and deaf awareness trainer Jean Miles, who suddenly lost her hearing 20 years ago in her late 30s, observes: "Hard of hearing or deafened people never admit it because they're automatically thought of as stupid.
"Even my friends would cross the road rather than speak to me after I lost my hearing because they didn't know how to react."
Mrs Miles became deaf because of an hereditary nerve condition that causes deterioration of the cochlea, the nerve in the inner ear. She does not use sign language, but is a skilled lip reader and teaches the subject at the centre, where she has been working since 1990.
She says: "My mother and sister were both deaf, but they went deaf in their 20s. I was the communicator in the family, and I thought I'd missed it. But then I went deaf in my late 30s.
"My family don't sign so I live in a hearing world, but I can't hear. I used to love ballroom dancing, but I can't do it now because I can't hear the music. I'm forgetting how to say some words because I'm no longer hearing them.
"Until I became deafened, I'd been a PR and company secretary for my husband, who ran an electrical, mechanical and hydraulics company. He's found it very hard to accept my deafness, even though he accepts my sister's deafness because that is the way he has always known her.
"I teach deaf awareness, and one of the things I teach is that it's as hard for the partner as it is for the person who loses their hearing."
Mr Maslen, who was previously a major in the Salvation Army, has been working at the centre since 1996.
He has been aware of the problems suffered by deaf people since his childhood.
He says: "My late parents, Charles and Irene Maslen, were both hard of hearing and wore hearing aids.
"My father was in the RAF and his hearing was affected by the air pressure when he was flying in bombers. My mother's hearing is believed to have been affected when she gave birth to myself and my twin brother."
"My mother never learned to sign, but she learned to lip-read and I'd hear things for her. She cried when I got married. Someone asked her if it was because she was losing her son and she replied: 'No, it's because I'm losing my ears'."
The centre is based at 16-18 King Square, after moving there in 1962 from the original Bristol Institute for the Deaf building at number 4.
The old name is still carved into the brickwork.
Mr Maslen declares: "The phrase 'deaf and dumb' isn't used any more."
Mrs Miles adds: "It's deaf without speech."
There are plans to mark the centre's 125th anniversary with a fete in King Square later this year, which will feature a deaf awareness exhibition, and demonstrations of the centre's lip reading and sign language classes.
The centre recently applied for a £50,000 National Lottery Grant for lip-reading classes, which are held on the premises, and also in locations around the Bristol area including Portishead, Nailsea, Cheddar, and Weston-super-Mare.
Mrs Miles says: "I want to get the lip-reading classes safe before I retire in 2010.
"I know how important it is to be able to lip-read – unfortunately the Learning and Skills Council has withdrawn funds for lip- reading, and we've had a drop in the number of people attending classes."
All eyes are down at the bingo session. Large red numbers are flashing on a screen – but there is no caller shouting "two fat ladies, 88" or "unlucky for some, 13".
Instead, there is silence. Then someone stands up and waves.
One of the players in the weekly bingo game at the Centre for Deaf People in Bristol's King Square has got a full house.
The weekly bingo at the 50+ Club is one of the many social activities provided at the centre for members, who range from schoolchildren to pensioners.
The collection of football pennants hanging around the bar testify to the centre's active football club.
There is also a snooker club, a well-attended youth club, a drama and film club, and a skittles club. There is even a church where all services are in sign language. All are a lifeline for people whose deafness makes it difficult to socialise in the hearing world
"Being deaf or hard of hearing can also mean being isolated," explains chief executive John Maslen.
The centre provides an array of equipment, in partnership with Bristol City Council, to make life easier for people who are deaf or hard of hearing. These include amplified telephones and text telephones, portable door bells, and personal listening systems to amplify the sound from television, radio, and conversation.
Mr Maslen says: "It's very different to 125 years ago when the Reverend Mayers, the minister at City Road Baptist Church, founded what was then the Bristol Institute for the Deaf and Dumb.
"He went out into the gas-lit streets and met people with no voices and no hearing and worked amongst them, and even took them home to his wife to get them washed.
"He was a deeply Christian man, and I think he had a passion for people. I think even today people need to have a passion to understand deaf people and to accept them as equals, not as subordinates.
"My own parents had hearing difficulties, which made their lives difficult. That's why I've got the passion."
Yet even with all the benefits of modern technology, and the social opportunities and counselling provided at the Centre for Deaf People, it can still be hard for those born deaf, or those who have become deaf, to cope with life in the hearing world.
Lip reading tutor and deaf awareness trainer Jean Miles, who suddenly lost her hearing 20 years ago in her late 30s, observes: "Hard of hearing or deafened people never admit it because they're automatically thought of as stupid.
"Even my friends would cross the road rather than speak to me after I lost my hearing because they didn't know how to react."
Mrs Miles became deaf because of an hereditary nerve condition that causes deterioration of the cochlea, the nerve in the inner ear. She does not use sign language, but is a skilled lip reader and teaches the subject at the centre, where she has been working since 1990.
She says: "My mother and sister were both deaf, but they went deaf in their 20s. I was the communicator in the family, and I thought I'd missed it. But then I went deaf in my late 30s.
"My family don't sign so I live in a hearing world, but I can't hear. I used to love ballroom dancing, but I can't do it now because I can't hear the music. I'm forgetting how to say some words because I'm no longer hearing them.
"Until I became deafened, I'd been a PR and company secretary for my husband, who ran an electrical, mechanical and hydraulics company. He's found it very hard to accept my deafness, even though he accepts my sister's deafness because that is the way he has always known her.
"I teach deaf awareness, and one of the things I teach is that it's as hard for the partner as it is for the person who loses their hearing."
Mr Maslen, who was previously a major in the Salvation Army, has been working at the centre since 1996.
He has been aware of the problems suffered by deaf people since his childhood.
He says: "My late parents, Charles and Irene Maslen, were both hard of hearing and wore hearing aids.
"My father was in the RAF and his hearing was affected by the air pressure when he was flying in bombers. My mother's hearing is believed to have been affected when she gave birth to myself and my twin brother."
"My mother never learned to sign, but she learned to lip-read and I'd hear things for her. She cried when I got married. Someone asked her if it was because she was losing her son and she replied: 'No, it's because I'm losing my ears'."
The centre is based at 16-18 King Square, after moving there in 1962 from the original Bristol Institute for the Deaf building at number 4.
The old name is still carved into the brickwork.
Mr Maslen declares: "The phrase 'deaf and dumb' isn't used any more."
Mrs Miles adds: "It's deaf without speech."
There are plans to mark the centre's 125th anniversary with a fete in King Square later this year, which will feature a deaf awareness exhibition, and demonstrations of the centre's lip reading and sign language classes.
The centre recently applied for a £50,000 National Lottery Grant for lip-reading classes, which are held on the premises, and also in locations around the Bristol area including Portishead, Nailsea, Cheddar, and Weston-super-Mare.
Mrs Miles says: "I want to get the lip-reading classes safe before I retire in 2010.
"I know how important it is to be able to lip-read – unfortunately the Learning and Skills Council has withdrawn funds for lip- reading, and we've had a drop in the number of people attending classes."