dmimi@uncecs.edu (Miriam Clifford) (01/12/90)
Index Number: 6187 Cued Speech is a system which amplifies speech reading with hand signs in such a way that those sound that look alike on the lips are differentiated. Since many speech sounds cannot be visibly distinguished, adding a hand sign to them permits the hearing impaired or deaf person to see what is actually being said. The system works by means of, I think it is five, one handed signals which are made in one of three places near the face. For example, the left hand with the fore finger extended may be held near the mouth, chin or neck. Each hand position means a different sound-- one finger extended from a fist may be an 'p', two fingers extended an 'm', three extended a 'b' and so on. Where the hand is held signals the vowel sound that goes with the consonant. The signals are made near the face so that mouth movements also provide as much information as possible. The system makes it possible to speech read standard language. The cues are basicall phonetic, so any dialect or language could be cued. I don't know that it will ever take the place of ASL or any other sign language, but I feel that it has some great advantages both for deaf children and adults who lose their hearing later in life. For the hearing impaired adult, the advantage is that he/she does not have to learn an entirely new and different language. He/she does, of course, have to find someone that can cue to him. The major advantage for deaf children is that it IS standard English (or whatever). The world of standard English becomes available to the person who cues. Most importantly, reading any level of material becomes possible (to the extent that the person can or will read). The terrible difficulty with abstract words and concepts does not exist because the deaf child can acquire a normal vocabulary and learns the syntax of the language just as anyone else does. The other advantage here, is that the parents of deaf babies (don't have to wait til the child is 3 or 4 or 5 years old) can learn to use cued speech fairly easily--if they are willing to work at it. Parents and others can cue as they talk to each other and/or to the child--everyone is using the same language. I don't think it is significantly harder to learn that ASL, though one does have to learn to think phonetically, and cuers are not terribly easy to find. The main difficulty is the lack of knowledge about cued speech and the relatively few cuers around. Of course, those who sign would find it difficult to switch to a new language--even tho doing so has some advantages. The is a person working of cueing glasses--glasses that have neon bars in the glass that can replicate cued speech signals. They are used with a computer that 'hears' the speech and translates it into the cues on the glasses--sort of like Mission Impossible, but cues instead of words. If these are ever practical, one would have cued speech available full time, with no other person needed to do the cueing. Even I could learn to use it then.