Language Deprivation in Deaf Children

Abstract

The present paper argues that early and robust access to language for children with hearing loss, hereby referred to as deaf cumulatively, carries critical implications for their development. The paper views the notion of language access, or lack of it, beyond the ability to understand or produce clear speech and even beyond the capacity to participate in conversations, or academic achievement. Language deprivation and its symptoms are presented using evidence from the areas of linguistics, social anthropology and psycholinguistics, focusing in its less obvious manifestations in different aspects of deaf children's development. The aim of the present paper is to raise awareness on symptoms of various degrees of language deprivation as a common occurrence in the deaf and hard of hearing population, and highlight linguistic interactions as mechanisms not only towards successful social adaptation but towards the willingness of an individual to contribute to social transformation (Hanks, 1996).