Myth! - I've met most Deaf people who are not able to speak orally and read-lip. Years of speech therapy did not help for most of them. It takes years of practices, memorizing, and attending therapies to be able to do it reasonably well.
The reason I mentioned memorizing is because most of them would have to remember which letters has sounds and which ones that doesn't have any sounds. For example, "S" and "Z" may look alike but in reality "S" doesn't have any sound while "Z" has a sound. Another excellent example is "B" and "P". "B" has sound while "P" doesn't.
In lip-reading, if a hearing person says "Bear" then the deaf person may think he/she is saying "Pear". It can be confusing sometimes. Most of them would have to remember all words. The Deaf people doesn't have advantages of being able to hear.
Also, many people have different ways of talking such as mumbling or moving their mouths, etc. It would take a while for a Deaf person to get used to the way a person is speaking.
> Myth or Reality?: All Deaf people are not able to take care of themselves.
Myth! - It's not true in many cases. Many Deaf people are very much capable of taking care of themselves. They're very independent and are able to make decisions for themselves. They are able to feed themselves, dress, drive, do anything they want to. In fact, many Deaf people live on their own. They pay bills just like everybody else.
> Myth or Reality?: Deaf people doesn't have any senses. (I.E. hearing, tasting, feeling, etc.)
Myth! - While Deaf people may not have sense of hearing, the other senses become stronger to offset the loss of hearing. Excellent examples are visions and feeling.
Vision doesn't necessarily mean they can see far away. The sense of vision may be like noticing things that a normal hearing person may have missed. Most of Deaf people are very good at reading body language, facial expression and actions of others. They depend on eyes for almost everything such as reading, driving, talking, etc. (Imagine this way: Eyes are like ears for Deaf people.)
The sense of feeling are often valuable to Deaf people because it helps them to feel vibrations. (Almost like a "second ear" to them) They rely on vibrations to feel music, any unusual "noises" or even fixing cars. (Most of them can feel the car running and may be able to notice anything unusual such as clugging of an engine or something like that.
> Myth or Reality?: Cochlear Implants can help Deaf people hear very well.
Myth! - It wouldn't help them very much. Deaf children does not have advantages of hearing like a normal hearing child since the hearing child already have an acquired language through hearing. Plus, he/she (the hearing children) are already familiar with many various sounds.
Imagine wires leading to the lights are cut off. Once it's cut off, lights would not work, right? It's almost like having nerves being cut off between the brain and the ears. (It's an analogy...)
If a Deaf child has cochlear implant, it may help him/her hear some sounds. It may not help him/her to carry a normal conversation like a hearing person can. Nor it will make him/her a "normal hearing. If he/she (the Deaf person) was in a room full of people and conversations coming from everwhere, it would only lead to more confusion and misunderstanding.
My strongest opinion is a person who lost his/her hearing at a later age may be a good choice to have cochlear implant because he/she already has a sense of hearing plus acquired language at a younger age. It just doesn't work the same for people who were born deaf..
One of several drawbacks for Deaf people having cochlear implants (C.I.). Let's imagine if he/she had cochlear implant installed at a younger age. When he/she become older, he/she changes their minds and decide not to wear cochlear implant. After C.I. is removed, it would leave a scar on their head where C.I. was.
> Myth or Reality?: There is no accents in American Sign Language (ASL).
Myth! - Nope! Just like spoken language, ASL does have accents! In some parts of states, some Deaf people sign slowly while in other parts of states, some sign very fast. There's style of using sign language like motions, the placement of hands while using sign language.
Some signs that has same meaning may be different around states. For example, birthday in sign language may have about 8-10 different signs! Soon may have about 4-5 different signs. One excellent example in Spoken English, "Right" have two different meanings.
