Communication Interventions with Deaf People

Communication Interventions with Deaf People concerns the application of spoken, signed, and written language interventions with deaf and hard of hearing children, young people, and adults. Exploring the work that speech and language therapists, pathologists, deaf language specialists, and other professionals carry out with deaf people, this volume extends beyond the classroom and provides clinical and real-life applications of learning and communication.

Historically, communication interventions with deaf people have prioritised spoken language and considered it to be the most ’appropriate’ and ’normal’ accomplishment. However, this book begins with a deaf perspective on communication interventions where the multiple languages, signed, spoken, and written, of deaf people are valued equally, and this paradigm shift is reflected throughout the various chapters.

With over forty contributors, the research and professional experience of experts working with deaf people, across national borders, is presented. Individual chapters describe the ways that services are delivered and detail different aspects of communication interventions, presenting the current evidence base and indicating areas where further research is needed.

Rosalind Herman Gelbart, Professor of Child Language and Deafness, Department of Language and Communication Science, City St George’s, University of London, Charlotte Enns, Professor Emerita, University of Manitoba

Rosalind Herman Gelbart is Professor of Child Language and Deafness in the Department of Language and Communication Science, City St George’s, University of London. Ros trained as a speech and language therapist and specialised in clinical work with deaf people. She has maintained her clinical work alongside research and training speech and language therapists. Her research interests are related to language acquisition, assessment, and interventions with deaf people.

Charlotte Enns is Professor Emerita in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba. Her background is in speech-language pathology but, despite her clinical training, she has always considered herself more of an educator than a clinician, which has strongly influenced her work with the language rights of deaf children. Charlotte’s research is focused on the bilingual education of deaf students, with a particular emphasis on language and literacy acquisition and assessment. She believes it is critical to involve deaf people in research about deaf people to gain the valuable scientific and humanitarian contributions provided through their embodied knowledge.