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The cochlear implant question

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Re: The cochlear implant question

#31

Post by FollowingTheDao »

keiferski wrote: post #5
FollowingTheDao wrote: post #2

Saying this as someone who is hearing but close to the deaf community in college and knows ASL. By trying to give her the best of both worlds she is going to diminish both worlds. Not fully in the deaf community and not fully in the hearing community.

Do you think bilingual kids have the same issue? I don’t.

I texted this comment to my deaf friend (a graduate of Gallaudet University) and she said; "Not bilingual kids, but certainly immigrants from non-english speaking countries! Just go to any big city and you will see a thriving Mexican, Chinese, or Indian community!" And she suggested you read just one book on the Deaf Community before being so certain. Deaf in America or Inside Deaf Culture would be a good start.

I will add that most people do not understand how divided the Deaf Community is about Coclear Implants. Least of all what you hear is not like what we would hear. It sounds like a robotic voice.

https://journals.sagepub.com/stoken/rbtfl/3WBTL0klZP48Y/full

Re: The cochlear implant question

#32

Post by FollowingTheDao »

keiferski wrote: post #9
robin_reala wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article talks about the capital-D Deaf community. It’s not just a different language, it’s a different culture.

And people that speak say, Chinese and American English, don’t have two different cultures?

Knowing ASL does not make me Deaf. And knowing Mandarin does not make me Chinese.

Re: The cochlear implant question

#33

Post by FollowingTheDao »

rincebrain wrote: post #14
Etheryte wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An alternative framing would be that she gets to experience both to at least some extent, and isn't that better?

I think a lot of people who have their feet in multiple commonly "either/or" cultures have written quite a lot about the struggle to establish their own identity given those cultures framing many things in terms of, for lack of a better word, sole/primary membership. I'm not sure anyone can say better or worse, in a useful fashion, objectively - more options can also lead to more ambiguity and stress, as with anythin…

"Just to be clear, I'm not trying to say I think any of what I just described is "good""

Yes, this has been the problem. Many in the Deaf Community do not see being deaf as "bad", but that is the label society has put on them.

Re: The cochlear implant question

#34

Post by pmarreck »

I wrote a commandline app that takes a youtube URL (or path to any audio or video file that ffmpeg can read) and converts it into a transcript using the Whisper model and then optionally translates or summarizes it using OpenAI. It's been incredibly useful for chewing through my youtube backlog, but it might also be hugely useful for the deaf or hearing-impaired. It uses Nix to manage dependencies, although I got clever about making that not necessary (I don't like forcing Nix on people until they're ready for it)

https://github.com/pmarreck/yt-transcriber

This is mainly useful for single-speaker videos that are conveying information.

Most other solutions out there that claim to do this only download the closed-captioning and summarize that, but MANY YouTubes do not have a good closed-captioning track, in which case my method still works. (Note: Aiming for Linux/Mac compatibility but have only tested it on Mac so far)

I next want to convert it into a simple web service and/or perhaps Docker image to democratize this out to everyone. (I don't know if I'd be able to afford to host since the CPU/GPU cost for running Whisper on spoken audio is not insignificant, but it should work fine on anyone's local machine assuming they have the hardware for it.)

I also want to add speaker identification (something called "diarization"), possibly by going to WhisperX or other solutions out there, which would make this more useful for multi-party conversation audio.

In other news, I'm looking for contract work (I'm just doing side projects like the above to keep myself busy and, ideally, useful). My last job was Director of Engineering for a startup, but due to having a toddler I wish to remain work-flexible for the time being. https://www.linkedin.com/in/petermarreck/

Re: The cochlear implant question

#35

Post by vr46 »

paulryanrogers wrote: post #3

> it is unarguable that only signed languages are easily accessible in all situations Even in the dark? Or at a distance? Or not facing the signer? Or with arthritis? Differently abled folks are entitled to their own culture and beliefs. Yet claims like that seem to be trying too hard to find a silver lining.

At a distance works great, my friend (not deaf, but works in a school) taught her kids BSL (also not deaf) and recounted the story of how she was able to bollock the kids once in public across a hall.

She also had no trouble ordering a drink from her boyfriend (not deaf) who was standing at the bar some way away in a crowded pub.

Sign languages are indeed quite useful.

The article seemed a bit straw man and whining, as well as recycling old ideas, such as letting groups isolate themselves from others, but I confess I was too bored to finish reading.

Re: The cochlear implant question

#36

Post by techsupporter »

swalker326 wrote: post #23

I have two deaf daughters, both have cochlear implants and I’m very happy with the decision. My wife and I both learned sign, and let our kids wear or not wear their cochlear’s as they see fit. The youngest is too young to really understand but the oldest understands and almost exclusively selects to wear them. She is in main stream school but does spend time with her dhh friends. She 100% prefers to be with other dh…

My niece was born deaf and her parents went the opposite direction: they chose not to have her get an implant because of the risk of surgery at such a young age and being fortunate to live in an area with a sizable deaf community. They took ASL classes (my spouse and I joined them) and she’s now enrolled in a mix of ASL and English interpreted classes.

I agree that people can only make the decision with what they have at the time. After watching her grow up these last several years, her parents think they made the right choice.

Re: The cochlear implant question

#37

Post by EdgeExplorer »

throw894389 wrote: post #20
paulryanrogers wrote: post #3

> it is unarguable that only signed languages are easily accessible in all situations Even in the dark? Or at a distance? Or not facing the signer? Or with arthritis? Differently abled folks are entitled to their own culture and beliefs. Yet claims like that seem to be trying too hard to find a silver lining.

My deaf coworker does not even know sign language, she uses phone for everything. She lives perfectly normal life. Entire office is not going to learn new language, just to speak with an odd deaf person. And communicating specialized stuff like technical programming is not possible, gestures only cover basic words.

Sign language is not gestures.

This is covered in (among many other places) the introduction to the Wikipedia article on sign language: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sign_language

Re: The cochlear implant question

#38

Post by bluGill »

mezzie2 wrote: post #21
paulryanrogers wrote: post #3

> it is unarguable that only signed languages are easily accessible in all situations Even in the dark? Or at a distance? Or not facing the signer? Or with arthritis? Differently abled folks are entitled to their own culture and beliefs. Yet claims like that seem to be trying too hard to find a silver lining.

Or if you have to talk to a visually impaired person. My vision impairments are on the very mild end of the spectrum, but they're still enough to prevent any effective use of or learning of sign.

I have "met" people who are both blind and deaf. They use sign language by putting their hand on the hand of the signer and follow that way. (I only know a couple signs so it wasn't worth trying to talk to them except via interpreter and so saying I've met them is a bit strong)

This also is proof that sign language works in the dark.

Re: The cochlear implant question

#39

Post by tokai »

EdgeExplorer wrote: post #37
throw894389 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My deaf coworker does not even know sign language, she uses phone for everything. She lives perfectly normal life. Entire office is not going to learn new language, just to speak with an odd deaf person. And communicating specialized stuff like technical programming is not possible, gestures only cover basic words.

Sign language is not gestures. This is covered in (among many other places) the introduction to the Wikipedia article on sign language: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sign_language

Pedantic and wrong. What was your point here? Sign languages per your own link are expressed through manual articulation in combination with non-manual markers. That's gestures in common speech in all cases unless you are operating with the most specific and unhelpful definition of gestures.

Re: The cochlear implant question

#40

Post by bluGill »

throw894389 wrote: post #20
paulryanrogers wrote: post #3

> it is unarguable that only signed languages are easily accessible in all situations Even in the dark? Or at a distance? Or not facing the signer? Or with arthritis? Differently abled folks are entitled to their own culture and beliefs. Yet claims like that seem to be trying too hard to find a silver lining.

My deaf coworker does not even know sign language, she uses phone for everything. She lives perfectly normal life. Entire office is not going to learn new language, just to speak with an odd deaf person. And communicating specialized stuff like technical programming is not possible, gestures only cover basic words.

When you need to communicate something technical you finger spell what you mean once, and the you make up a sign on the spot for that one thing and use that sign there after. The next conversation you can make up a different sign for the same thing, or reuse the old sign. If a sign is used often enough it enters the common language.

By doing such you can communicate anything technical.

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