I've now been taking American Sign Language for the past three years. I've fallen in love with not only the language, but the culture.
The deaf community is often never listened too.
They are put off to the side as if they are lesser than the hearing. After learning the culture, I learned that the deaf love to be deaf and don't feel they are lesser or handicapped. After groundbreaking research to help the deaf hear came to life, they wanted nothing to do with it. Here is my opinion.
A cochlea implant is a hearing device that implanted in order to help the deaf hear.
A cochlear implant consists of an internal and external piece. The internal piece is surgically inserted under the skin behind the ear, and a narrow wire is threaded into the inner ear. The external piece, which looks somewhat like a behind-the-ear hearing aid, is connected to the internal one through the skin via an external magnetic disk. Hearing aids may be helpful for someone people, but for others, it is not helpful at all, therefore, the implant is the next step.
If I was a deaf child, I would probably want the surgery. I would want to know what the hearing world has to offer. As a young child, you are in the perfect stage to receive the implant because you have time to develop your skills to speak and understand better. It takes a lot of time and effort, after the implant to learn to speak and hear. I would be scared about the surgery but I would feel the surgery would deeply benefit me. The surgery would let me be able to experience the hearing world, but I would still try to include myself in the deaf world. In a Ted Talk Heather Artinian, she explained how you have the option to live in both worlds, and that what I feel I would do. Heather wanted the implant as a child but her parents had a strong influence on her dissension, she too wanted to experience the hearing world. As a deaf child, I would strongly consider and want the implant.
I personally feel the largest factor that would make it hard for me to get the surgery is the fact that I'm slightly removing myself from deaf culture. In many of the movies and documentaries I’ve watched on people receiving the implant, the deaf community is not very supportive and they feel that the implants are going to cause the deaf community to die out. I feel that in the beginning, the implant stage will be the hardest time. I believe that you can’t really be part of the hearing world yet because you don't have the skills yet to be a full active hearing and speaking person, as well as the deaf community is now looking at you differently.
After receiving the implant, I feel that you should be using sign and speech.
Sign should still be used because I feel it would be a better transition. Not only for transitioning, but by using sign you're still including yourself in the deaf world. After you receive your implant, your speech takes a lot of time to develop. So, without sign, you would not have any form of communication at all.
I feel that this is another surgery that can be helping people out.
There are, of course, many pros and cons. Some cons are that the implant may kill deaf culture. If so, many people receive the implant and then strictly consider themselves hearing. Another con is that it's a surgery and all surgeries come with a risk, as well as the implant is a lot for some people and can be a very stressful transition. It also requires a lot of time and effort. With the implant also comes many pros such as, it gives people a chance to hear and have that experience to hear what the world has to offer. Also the implant can give people better opportunities in life, because some people are not as accepting of deafness and the implant can remove that label of ‘Deaf’ from a person. Overall, I think the surgery is more of a positive rather a negative.
