Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf Download Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf from with Mediafire Link Download Link
Revue de presse
"Fascinating and richly rewarding--. Sacks is a profoundly wise observer."--
The Plain Dealer"One cannot read more than a few pages of Sacks without seeing something in a new way. His breadth of understanding and expression seems limitless."--
Kansas City Star"A remarkable book, penetrating, subtle, persuasive--. [It] will likely become a classic."--
St. Louis Post-DispatchPrésentation de l'éditeur
With Seeing Voices Dr Sacks launches us on a journey into the world of the deaf – which he explores with the same passion and insight that have illuminated other human conditions for his readers everywhere. ‘Oliver Sacks, blessed with an understanding heart and poetic voice, speaks the language of the deaf. An exquisite, as well as revelatory, work’ Studs Terkel ‘This scholarly and carefully documented book is a landmark for deaf rights. It makes the gigantic, imaginative leap so essential to understanding total deafness’ Jack Ashley, Sunday Telegraph ‘Compelling . . . A journey well worth taking . . . One cannot read more than a few pages of Sacks without seeing something in a new way’ Los Angeles Times ‘Written by a hearing – and caring – neurologist who through empathy and contact has penetrated a long way into deaf culture. What he has written about should be compulsory reading – I do not recall another book which puts the issues so clearly for the rest of us’ Alex Comfort, Guardian ‘A manifesto characteristically humane and impassioned . . . Once more Sacks proves he is the doyen of science with a human face’ Roy Porter, Sunday Times
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Books with free ebook downloads available Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf (English Edition) [Format Kindle]
In this extraordinary study, Dr. Sacks gives the general reader a penetrating insight into the world of the deaf. In his acclaimed "The Man Who Mistook his Wife for a Hat", as a practicing neurologist, he brought his readers into the bizarre world of terrible brain related illnesses, presenting twenty-four cases of individuals afflicted with such diseases as agnosia or prosopagnosia, where "normal" reality is turned inside out, and how some of these diseases are treated and how the patients cope with their condition. In "Seeing Voices", he permits us entry into the silent, at times strange, though culturally rich world of the congenitally and pre-lingually deaf.
As someone who has had no previous experience or knowledge in this area, for me this text opened a whole new area of culture and history that is continually growing and developing.
Sacks' explores the nature of language, touching upon Noam Chomsky's paradigm-shifting studies, "Syntactic Structures", "Cartesian Linguistics" and Language of Mind", where he proposes his theory that language is innate, lying dormant until it is made active through human interaction and culture. Sacks connects these theories to the pre-lingual deaf and its implications and manifestations.
We are also given a history lesson on the language of SIGN, how it has developed, why it was jettisoned, out of ignorant prejudice, in the late nineteenth century, and its miraculous come back in the twentieth century. Through Sacks' concise and straightforward prose, he connects us to the foreign world of another language not depended on speech, its intricacies and its wonder, and how those of us who have the ability to hear and to verbalize, all too often take language for granted. He also makes clear the sophistication of Sign as a form of legitimate communication, its grammatical foundations and its many nuances, and how, in some ways, it is a superior form of active exchange between people.
In chapter three, Sacks tells us about the cultural breakthrough at Gallaudet University in March 1988, where after massive student protest, the school literally closed down, the first ever deaf president of the university was appointed. Sacks witnessed this social changing event first hand, which in the end affected him more than he realized,
"I had to see this all for myself before I could be moved from my previous "medical" view of deafness (as a condition, a deficit, that had to be "treated") to a "cultural" view of the deaf as forming a community with a complete language and culture of its own." (P.129-30)
Indeed this entire text has changed my view that deafness is not simply a condition or human deficit, but another way of being in the world. In fact the deaf, with their shared language are forming a world community and culture crossing all barriers. And as Dr. Sacks points out, in this way, "...the deaf have something to teach us." (P. 167)
Par C. Middleton
- Publié sur Amazon.com
Seeing Voices gives a clear answer to the question, "Which comes first? Language or thought." The answer, "Language." As Sacks retells stories of the profoundly deaf deprived of "language" into early adulthood, the pattern emerges: Without language there is no abstraction, no ability to achieve love or communication, and all life becomes an inarticulate groaning to have basic needs met immediately. There is no sense of time - life becomes an eternal present. The discovery of language leads to intense sadness as one realizes the lonely prison they have been in. In a long life of reading, this is the first book I immediately re-read on completing it the first time.
Par PeterC
- Publié sur Amazon.com