Cued speech
From Free net encyclopedia
Cued Speech is a system of communication used with and among deaf or hard of hearing people. It aims to make a tradionally spoken language accessible by using a small number of handshapes (representing consonants) in different locations near the mouth (representing vowels), as a supplement to lipreading. It is now used with people with a variety of language, speech, communication and learning needs.
Cued Speech was invented in 1965-66 by Dr. R. Orin Cornett at Gallaudet college. After discovering that children with prelingual and profound hearing impairments typically have poor reading comprehension, he developed the system with the aim of improving the reading abilities of such children through better comprehension of the phonemes of spoken English. As many sounds look identical on the lips (such as /p/ and /b/), the hand signals introduce a visual contrast in place of the formerly acoustic contrast. Cued Speech may also help people hearing incomplete or distorted sound — according to cuedspeech.com, "cochlear implants and Cued Speech are powerful partners".
Though, to a layperson, Cued Speech may look similar to signing, Cued Speech is not a sign language; it is an oral-manual mode of a spoken language. Originally designed to represent American English, the system was adapted to French in 1977. As of 2005, Cued Speech has been adapted to approximately 60 languages and dialects, including six dialects of English. For tonal languages such as Thai, the tone is indicated by inclination and movement of the hand.
See also
References
External links
Cued Speech organizations
- Cued Language Network of America (CLNA)
- Language Matters (LMI)
- National Cued Speech Association of the USA (NCSA)
- Cued Speech Association UK
- Testing, Evaluation, and Certification Unit (TECUnit) for transliterators in the USA.
Tutorials and general information
- The Art of Cueing - extensive free course for cueing American dialects of English, containing Quicktime video samples.
- Cued Speech Discovery - The NCSA bookstore. Some overview information.
- Cued Speech INFO - Overview of Cued Speech, FAQs, Common Misconceptions.
- DailyCues.com - News and learning resources, some free online.