|
 7:1
Friday, January 14, 2005
The New Zeitgeist
Observations on the Education of
Deaf Students in the 21st Century
In 2000, the International Congress on Education of the Deaf (ICED) held its
19th conference in Sydney, Australia. More than 1,000 teachers,
administrators, and researchers from 46 countries addressed an extremely wide
selection of topics ranging from the inclusion of deaf students in regular
educational environments to deaf students in post-secondary school education.
Educating Deaf
Students: Global Perspectives edited by Des Power and Greg Leigh brings
together a select cross-section of the issues addressed at the 19th ICED.
As noted by Power and Leigh, “[T]here is much about which we should, as a field
of education, be optimistic. It is true, however, that we are still well short
of achieving all of our goals for the education of deaf students. There are
numerous areas where our knowledge and practice remain significantly limited.
Nevertheless, it would appear that, as a consequence of research and practical
endeavor, the field of education of deaf children is in a better position to
make more sustained progress in many of these areas than at any point in its
long history.”
Read more about the past, present, and future of
deaf education in “Reviewing the Past, Assessing the
Present, and Projecting the Future,” and
secure a copy of Educating Deaf Students with your exclusive
subscriber 20% discount.
 “For
a book that arose from a conference and was presumably not carefully structured
in advance, Genetics, Disability, and Deafness does seem -- even with the
history before the science -- remarkably well-put-together, in large part due to
the well-matched opening and closing pairs. The pieces in between, though not as
even as a single writer would have made them nor as systematic as an attempt to
cover the issue comprehensively might have made them, are not as jarring a
collection as sometimes results from a conference, and especially a
multidisciplinary conference. It’s actually a pretty good read, which is not
something you can always say about academic books.” This was the sentiment of a
recent review in Ragged Edge Magazine of
Genetics,
Disability, and Deafness, a volume of essays on science, the humanities, and
history which shows the many ways that disability, deafness, and the new
genetics interact and its meaning for society. Read more about this intriguing topic in the first paper,
“The Science of
Human Nature and the Human Nature of Science,” by Pulitzer Prize-winning
author Louis Menand, and
order Genetics, Disability, and Deafness.
 The
Midwest Book Review extolls R. H. Miller’s
Deaf Hearing Boy: A
Memoir, calling it “A compelling testimony drawn directly from heart and memory.”
In its entirety it reads, “The second volume of the
Deaf Lives series,
Deaf Hearing Boy: A Memoir is the true story of the author, born in 1938 as the
oldest of four hearing boys to deaf parents. Deaf Hearing Boy chronicles growing
up in changing times, and the author’s own experience as the sometimes unwilling
liaison between his deaf parents and hearing grandparents. The end of World War
II brought poverty to the family, as returning soldiers displaced his parents’
jobs and they had to resort to scraping by on the family farm. Deaf Hearing Boy
chronicles an era when small farms gradually faded from the landscape, and
cultural connectivity began to erode the isolation of deaf people. It tells of
prejudice against the deaf, from fathers who would not let the author date their
daughters for fear that the author carried a gene for deafness that would be
passed on, to misunderstandings within the family and more. And it tells of a
young man’s abiding respect for his parents, despite the problems unique to a
deaf couple striving to raise hearing children. A compelling testimony drawn
directly from heart and memory.” Read part of Miller’s compelling account as the
oldest of four hearing boys born to deaf parents in chapter seven,
“A New Life”, and
order Deaf
Hearing Boy.
Just visiting?
Subscribe now to the Gallaudet University Press
E-newsletter and receive exclusive updates, book excerpts, and
discounts...absolutely free.
Read previous Gallaudet University Press E-newsletters:
Spring 2005 Catalog
HomePage
Contact the webmaster at
gupress@gallaudet.edu
Copyright 1999-2005 Gallaudet University. All rights reserved. |
