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Studies of homesigns have shed light on the human capacity for language and on the challenging problem of language acquisition. The study of homesign has evolved from a perspective grounded in gesture studies and child development to include sign language linguistics and the role of homesigns in language emergence at the community level. One overarching finding is that homesigns more closely resemble sign languages used by linguistic communities than they resemble the gestures produced by hearing people along with spoken language. Homesigns may not exhibit all of the linguistic properties of community languages, but the properties they do exhibit are language properties, and for the people who use them, homesigns are their language. Further, the linguistic structures in homesigns are innovated by the deaf people who use them and are imperfectly learned by their hearing communication partners. I close with a call to action: We cannot celebrate discoveries about the mind made possible by studies of homesigns and emerging languages while ignoring the pervasiveness of language deprivation among deaf people, and the relative lack of deaf participation in science, even in studies of sign languages. While the scientific community learns much from studying homesigns and sign languages, we also have a responsibility to work toward ensuring that every deaf person has access to language, communication, and education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The educational inclusion of deaf students in England is usually interpreted as placement in mainstream settings alongside hearing students, creating unintended pressure for assimilation to the communicative needs of hearing people. In this context, it is deaf students and their communication support staff who are left to deal with communicative disparities found in educational settings. This ethnographic study explored episodes of communication breakdown in communicative interactions of 5 deaf college students in a further education college in Northern England. Analysis coded what was the source of breakdown, who noticed it, who repaired communication and what strategy was used. Findings were organised into three themes, reflecting how breakdowns were dealt with either by deaf students or their Communication Support Workers, or as a shared concern with teaching staff. Overall, deaf students were noted to deal with miscommunication through translanguaging, deploying their multilingual and multimodal repertoires to engage with multiple audiences and repair communication. Findings reflect how deaf students are overburdened with responsibility for ensuring communication is sustained, which opens further questions regarding the pressure to assimilate to hearing normative ways of communicating. Restricting deaf students’ communication to English may limit their development as bi/multilinguals and their learning experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract\nPoints of interestThe Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 places a duty on public bodies to consider the impact of their decisions on future generations and to work towards achieving the seven well-being goals. Using doctrinal, socio-legal and autoethnographic methods, this article seeks to ascertain whether the needs of the Welsh deaf community have been considered. The Act does not explicitly mention them, and there is no evidence that public bodies have taken their needs into account when implementing the Act. The Welsh deaf community is marginalised in Welsh society, and this has been exacerbated by the closure of deaf schools and the decline of deaf clubs. The Welsh Government and the Future Generations Commissioner have a responsibility to ensure that the well-being of the Welsh deaf community is considered in the implementation of the Act and recommendations and thoughts are put forward on how they can achieve this.The law for the well-being of future generations in Wales requires government and public services to think about how their decisions impact the future.The Welsh Deaf community faces barriers in society, made worse by the closure of deaf schools and a decline in deaf clubs.The Welsh Government and the commissioner responsible for the well-being of future generations need to ensure that the law benefits everyone, including the Welsh Deaf community.Recommendations for action are suggested, and the Welsh Government and commissioner should ensure the Welsh Deaf community is included when they think about the well-being of future generations.The law for the well-being of future generations in Wales requires government and public services to think about how their decisions impact the future.The Welsh Deaf community faces barriers in society, made worse by the closure of deaf schools and a decline in deaf clubs.The Welsh Government and the commissioner responsible for the well-being of future generations need to ensure that the law benefits everyone, including the Welsh Deaf community.Recommendations for action are suggested, and the Welsh Government and commissioner should ensure the Welsh Deaf community is included when they think about the well-being of future generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little is known about how information to the left of fixation impacts reading and how it may help to integrate what has been read into the context of the sentence. To better understand the role of this leftward information and how it may be beneficial during reading, we compared the sizes of the leftward span for reading-matched deaf signers (n = 32) and hearing adults (n = 40) using a gaze-contingent moving window paradigm with windows of 1, 4, 7, 10, and 13 characters to the left, as well as a no-window condition. All deaf participants were prelingually and profoundly deaf, used American Sign Language (ASL) as a primary means of communication, and were exposed to ASL before age eight. Analysis of reading rates indicated that deaf readers had a leftward span of 10 characters, compared to four characters for hearing readers, and the size of the span was positively related to reading comprehension ability for deaf but not hearing readers. These findings suggest that deaf readers may engage in continued word processing of information obtained to the left of fixation, making reading more efficient, and showing a qualitatively different reading process than hearing readers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deaf people, and those who engage in criminal offending have independently been identified as groups at risk for childhood trauma, though consideration of their intersectional impact is limited. The adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) of 26 males detained to a deaf secure mental health service were explored. Overall, 92.3% of participants had experienced an ACE. Most participants had experienced multiple adversities (Median = 6), with 73.1% exposed to four or more, and 57.7% exposed to six or more. Most participants (76.9%) had experienced both child maltreatment and household adversity. The most prevalent ACEs were emotional neglect and parental separation (76.9%). Participants who had been subject to a care order reported more child maltreatment ACEs (p =.02). Given the pervasive ACE histories of deaf people in secure mental health services, the integration of trauma-informed practices within an environment that is sensitive and responsive to the complex trauma needs of this population is of paramount importance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: In this study we investigated the effect of cochlear implantation on tinnitus in patients with post lingual bilateral profound hearing loss. Methods: In this retrospective study, 66 post-lingual deaf patients over 18 years old who referred for cochlear implantation and complained of tinnitus were included. Patients were divided into two groups with residual hearing (in frequency 250–500 Hz) and without residual hearing. All data including age, gender, type of implants, type of surgery, cause of the disease, and information on the THI score before cochlear implantation, one month after cochlear implantation and one year after cochlear implantation was recorded and analyzed. Results: Nine patients had residual hearing, while 57 patients did not. After one month and one year, in both groups, the mean THI score has decreased significantly (p-value = 0.001), but there was no significant difference in the mean THI score before surgery and one month and one year after surgery between two groups with and without residual hearing. There was no significant difference in tinnitus severity according to THI-grade between two groups. Also there was no significant difference in THI score and the cause of the hearing loss, type and insertion method of implantation, one month and one year after the surgery between two groups. Conclusion: According to our results, the was no significant correlation between residual hearing and tinnitus score before surgery, one month and one year after the surgery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In many countries across the world education for deaf people is limited and sign languages are undervalued. In this paper we discuss insights from an initiative to support deaf education for young adults in India, Ghana, and Uganda. Reporting here on the work in India, our project used a bilingual approach, with Indian Sign Language as the main means of communication while developing students' English literacy through a multiliteracies pedagogy (Cope, Bill, and Mary Kalantzis, eds. 2000. Multiliteracies: Literacy Learning and the Design of Social Futures. London: Routledge) and the use of authentic texts in lessons. Our approach was designed to invite learners' agency and input. Responding to students' engagement with the approach, we encountered their demand for formal grammar teaching and we offer an example of how one of the tutors engaged with this. Illustrated with visual data from the lessons, we discuss two insights from the project: the importance of the students' 'semiotic repertoire' (Kusters, Annelies, Massimiliano Spotti, Ruth Swanwick, and Elina Tapio. 2017. "Beyond Languages, Beyond Modalities: Transforming the Study of Semiotic Repertoires." International Journal of Multilingualism 14 (3): 219–232.) ; and the centrality of an inclusive educational approach that is supportive of students' agency and aspirations for learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Foco (Interdisciplinary Studies Journal) is the property of Revista Foco and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

As urbanization and population growth continue, cities concentrate an increasing amount of people, energy, and economy. Multi-story buildings enable densification, requiring vertical transport for access to upper floors. This is crucial for people with disabilities, who may face barriers in the built environment. Elevators are essential for accessibility, allowing everyone, including people with disabilities, to comfortably access multi-story buildings. However, barriers to inclusivity remain, often subtle and hard to define. This paper highlights one such example, focusing on elevator use by individuals with varying degrees of hearing loss. Currently, they cannot establish one-to-one communication with the outside world if trapped in an elevator. Under EN standards, this issue stems from alarm system requirements that lack effective alternatives to voice communication. Based on this evidence, the research was carried out in two steps, with the aim of understanding the needs of deaf individuals when using elevators by directly involving them in the study. First, a questionnaire conducted in Italy collected information regarding the safety and usability of elevators. Second, a test campaign involving both deaf and normal-hearing participants was carried out to quantify the severity of the issue and evaluate potential solutions to address the identified challenges. The conclusions indicate that current alarm systems in elevators are inadequate for individuals with hearing impairments, and effective alternatives must be implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 5% of people around the world have hearing disabilities, which limits their capacity to communicate with others. Recently, scientists have proposed systems based on deep learning techniques to create a sign language-to-text translator, expecting this to help deaf people communicate; however, the performance of such systems is still low for practical scenarios. Furthermore, the proposed systems are language-oriented, which leads to particular problems related to the signs for each language. For this reason, to address this problem, in this paper, we propose a system based on a Recursive Neural Network (RNN) focused on Mexican Sign Language (MSL) that uses the spatial tracking of hands and facial expressions to predict the word that a person intends to communicate. To achieve this, we trained four RNN-based models using a dataset of 600 clips that were 30 s long; each word included 30 clips. We conducted two experiments; we tailored the first experiment to determine the most well-suited model for the target application and measure the accuracy of the resulting system in offline mode; in the second experiment, we measured the accuracy of the system in online mode. We assessed the system's performance using the following metrics: the precision, recall, F1-score, and the number of errors during online scenarios, and the results computed indicate an accuracy of 0.93 in the offline mode and a higher performance for the online operating mode compared to previously proposed approaches. These results underscore the potential of the proposed scheme in scenarios such as teaching, learning, commercial transactions, and daily communications among deaf and non-deaf people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the extent to which healthcare interpreting can be considered "relational practice." It describes an interactional sociolinguistic study conducted in Australia, based on video recordings of two naturally occurring interpreted general practice consultations. Participants were hearing Australian Sign Language (Auslan)/English interpreters, deaf patients, and hearing doctors. Analysis of these recordings was supplemented by reflective interviews with participants. The study examines the ways in which interpreters facilitate good working relationships between participants, and to explore the extent to which their decision-making is driven by relational considerations. The analyses presented in this article provide evidence that relational work is an important aspect of the healthcare interpreter's role. Some of the ways in which it is achieved, however, may challenge our ideas about "appropriate" interpreter behaviour. Thus, the skilled and experienced interpreters in the study were seen to modify face threats, directly influence the flow of interaction, and actively facilitate social talk and humour, occasionally even engaging in it themselves. It is argued that interpreters' decisions can only be understood within the discursive context in which they occur, and such behaviour can highlight interpreters' attentiveness to the maintenance of good rapport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cultural-linguistic education of the deaf has been minimally incorporated into the Chilean educational system. It has only been in the past decade that deaf adults have been included in classrooms with didactic approaches centered on hearing culture. This research aims to investigate deaf narratives to develop a pedagogical proposal grounded in deaf epistemologies. A semi-structured interview was conducted with 15 deaf individuals using Chilean Sign Language. The data collected was analyzed using Atlas.ti software, employing open and axial coding. The findings indicate that a pedagogical approach for the deaf should encompass the following elements: deaf identity, Chilean Sign Language, and a safe educational environment. The conclusions suggest that these pedagogical proposals should integrate a pedagogy with a deaf experiential perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disabled people encounter numerous barriers to accessibility and face discrimination and inequalities in their daily lives. The situation is even more complex for migrants with a disability, who have to learn how to navigate a new bureaucratic system. This study focuses on deaf adult migrants and the linguistic and bureaucratic challenges they face in Swedish society. The data consists of interviews with 43 deaf migrants participating in language learning courses in four folk high schools catering to deaf people in Sweden. Crip Theory and Crip Linguistics are used as lenses to explore the impact of able-bodiedness and linguistic norms on this particular group. The findings show that deaf migrants experience infantilisation, that sign language interpreters are often seen as a one-size-fits-all solution without much consideration for other factors influencing communication, and that normative able-bodiedness underlies many of the bureaucratic issues deaf migrants face. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability of a person to communicate with other people and engage with the outside environment makes it crucial to a person's existence. It can be challenging for all the people who have hearing loss to communicate without the aid of lip reading, facial expression, or signals. Also, without instruction, it is challenging for them to comprehend lip movements, which makes it challenging for them to hear spoken words. The visual speech recognition devices for lip reading were developed to solve this issue and help the deaf understand speech. Recently, Visual Voice Recognition research has focused a lot on deep learning advancements. Here, we suggested the LSTM and CNN 3D hybrid model for MIRACL VC1 Dataset visual speech recognition. When a person's lip features are extracted for pattern detection, the text without audio is converted in this process. A model used to automatically recognize speech is called visual speech recognition. The proposed work stands apart from the previous work by incorporation the hybrid model, the combination of the models would yield a better and efficient accuracy rate comparatively and also the focal novelty of the proposed work was that the concatenation of the extracted features to provide an input to the system was a challenging one so has to manage the weights in the entire process of extraction for a huge number of dataset. It was suggested that two separate models, CNN 3D and LSTM, be combined to create hybrid model in mandate to progress the overall accuracy in this case. In comparison with the individual CNN 3D model, whose testing accuracy is 79%, and the LSTM model, whose accuracy was 85% when we employed the English Dataset, the hybrid model's training, test, and validation accuracy were all 98, 85, and 86%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Foco (Interdisciplinary Studies Journal) is the property of Revista Foco and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Abstract\nPoints of InterestThe Covid-19 pandemic changed the structures of communication, interaction and daily life for everyone. In this study, we examine what those changed social circumstances revealed to deaf young people about their identity, opportunities, strengths and vulnerabilities. Forty-six deaf young people aged 16–19 during the pandemic were interviewed by either deaf co-inquirers or academic researchers with a strong background in working with deaf people. Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. Findings demonstrate that the mental health challenges of the times were not new to many participants but rather just more of the familiar experiences of limited contact with others. However, the circumstances spotlighted attributes deaf people had which had been hidden previously to others including resilience, digital skills and creativity. Improved educational access through digital media was positive eventually but required some self-advocacy to achieve parity.Deaf young people entered lockdown already familiar with limited social contacts, fragile communication and experiences of isolation.Deaf young people discovered new facets of different kinds of deaf identity during the pandemic.There were gains for some deaf young people during the pandemic, including more accessible learning.Skills and abilities that had been unrecognised by others could flourish during the pandemic.Deaf young people entered lockdown already familiar with limited social contacts, fragile communication and experiences of isolation.Deaf young people discovered new facets of different kinds of deaf identity during the pandemic.There were gains for some deaf young people during the pandemic, including more accessible learning.Skills and abilities that had been unrecognised by others could flourish during the pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective To investigate the expression and clinical significance of miR-34c and miR-29b in peripheral blood of patients with sensorineural hearing loss. Methods 140 patients with neurological deafness admitted to our hospital from June 2020 to June 2023 were included in the study group, and 40 healthy subjects were included in the control group during the same period. SNHL patients were categorized into 63 cases in the mildly deaf group, 42 cases in the moderately deaf group, and 35 cases in the severely deaf group according to their hearing impairment. The expressions of miR-34c and miR-29b were detected by qRT-PCR, and VEGF, oxidative stress (TAC, SOD, MDA), NO and Cx26 were detected. Correlation analysis was performed by Pearson test, independent risk factors for SNHL severity were calculated by logistics regression algorithm, and the predictive value of miR-34c and miR-29b on the severity of SNHL patients was evaluated by ROC curve. Results Comparing the levels of NO, TAC, SOD, and Cx26 among the four groups, severe deafness group < moderate deafness group < mild deafness group < control group (P < 0.05); comparing the levels of VEGF and MDA, severe deafness group > moderate deafness group > mild deafness group > control group (P < 0.05). Comparison of miR-34c mRNA and miR-29b mRNA expression levels among the four groups, severe deafness group > moderate deafness group > mild deafness group > control group (P < 0.05). Pearson's test showed that SNHL patients' peripheral blood miR-34c and miR-29b were positively correlated with VEGF and MDA, and were negatively correlated with NO, TAC, SOD and Cx26 (P < 0.05). negative correlation (P < 0.05). Multifactorial logistic regression analysis showed that VEGF, MDA, NO, Cx26, TAC, SOD, miR-34c, miR-29b were independent factors affecting the severity of SNHL. Conclusion miR-34c and miR-29b are overexpressed in SNHL patients and can be used as serum markers for predictive assessment of disease severity in SNHL patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Hereditary hearing loss is an important component of congenital hearing loss. MARVELD2 (OMIM ID:610572), located in the DFNB49 locus, which encodes a tight junction protein tricellulin playing an important role in the sensory epithelial barrier of the inner ear, may contribute to nonsyndromic autosomal recessive hereditary hearing loss. Methods: Two Han Chinese pedigrees with hearing loss underwent clinical and genetic analyses. Variants were detected by targeted next‐generation sequencing and sequencing data were compared with the Human Genome Reference (GRCh 37/hg 19) to identify mutant genes and loci. Furthermore, online tools such as RDDC, SpliceAI, and REVEL were used to predict risks from different variants. Results: Both two probands failed neonatal hearing screening and were diagnosed with sensorineural hearing loss. A total of 3 mutations were detected in the two families, c.1331+1G>A, c.1325A>G, and c.782G>A. According to ACMG/AMP guidelines, they were judged to be pathogenic, uncertain significance, and uncertain significance, respectively. Conclusions: These findings contribute to a better understanding of the relationship between different variants of MARVELD2 and hearing. This could further expand the spectrum of deafness gene mutations and contribute to deafness patient management and genetic counseling. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to enable deaf and hard-of-hearing people to communicate with other individuals who know and do not know sign language. The mobile application was developed for video classification by using MediaPipe Library in the study. While doing this, considering the problems that deaf and hearing loss individuals face in Turkey and abroad modelling and training stages were carried out with the English language option. With the real-time translation feature added to the study individuals were provided with instant communication. In this way, communication problems experienced by hearing-impaired individuals will be greatly reduced. Machine learning and Deep learning concepts were investigated in the study. Model creation and training stages were carried out using VGG16, OpenCV, Pandas, Keras, and Os libraries. Due to the low success rate in the model created using VGG16, the MediaPipe library was used in the formation and training stages of the model. The reason for this is that, thanks to the solutions available in the MediaPipe library, it can normalise the coordinates in 3D by marking the regions to be detected in the human body. Being able to extract the coordinates independently of the background and body type in the videos in the dataset increases the success rate of the model in the formation and training stages. As a result of an experiment, the accuracy rate of the deep learning model is 85% and the application can be easily integrated with different languages. It is concluded that deep learning model is more accure than machine learning one and the communication problem faced by hearing-impaired individuals in many countries can be reduced easily. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A method of communication for the deaf and the dumb is sign language (SL). Knowing SL allows speakers and listeners to converse effectively with deaf and dumb people. Yet, while they can acquire sign language (SL) to communicate with the dumb and the deaf, untrained persons are unable to speak with them. For such individuals, an SL to text system is more beneficial in enabling them to communicate more effectively with everyday people. To interact with the deaf and dumb, SL is a tactile gesture that employs the hands and eyes. This proposes a new model for translating SL video to text conversion or generation. Frame Conversion is the initial step, where the given input video is converted into frames. Subsequently, features considered are hierarchy of skeleton and Improved Motion estimation (ME). For generating the text, this work uses an optimised LSTM model, where training of weights is done by hybrid Combined Pelican and BES algorithm (CP-BES). Moreover, the mean value for dataset ISL-CSLTR has achieved the proposed method is 27.3%, 31.6%, 28.7%, 33.4%, 29.8%, 24.5%, 36.2%, and 34.8% greater than the conventional schemes like CNN, FSU-CNN, ASL – CNN, RNN, LSTM +POA, LSTM +ARCHOA, LSTM +HGS, LSTM +PRO and LSTM +BES. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Foco (Interdisciplinary Studies Journal) is the property of Revista Foco and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article examines the accessibility of theater performances for Deaf audiences in Slovakia, with a main focus on the provision of Theater Sign Language Interpreting (TSLI). Drawing on analysis of current access strategies, the authors highlight examples of good practice aligned with more user-centred, inclusive and participatory access-provision models. Based on the results of an exploratory qualitative research interview with the key representative of the Deaf community involved in their development in the country, the main principles within these strategies are identified. Through this exploration, the article advocates for further enhancement of integrated and inclusive access strategies in Slovak theaters and further reveals the characteristics as well as the potential of professional TSLI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores anticolonial maternal politics by turning away from the conventional formulation of the singular enfleshed maternal body and toward the body of the maternal home. It does so through an architectural approach to kinship emerging from a feature-film collaboration, The Nest. A return to the author's childhood home, the film looks to lost histories and kinship structures embedded in place. Focusing on the Indigenous/Métis, Deaf, Japanese, and South Asian girls and women who lived in the house across 140 years of Canadian history, the film upends national history in service of "brick and mortar kinships," a counter-historical approach that captures the untold and disregarded radical maternities that characterize domestic space in the settler colony. Framed by the author's own maternal relations, the essay considers the transtemporal, trans-maternal, and transcultural political bonds that arise through shared space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BACKGROUND: Deaf people using sign and/or spoken language and hearing-impaired people using spoken language face frequent difficulties in activities of daily living due to the communication barriers. Among the main strategies to compensate or mitigate these difficulties we find assistive devices: video relay services, cochlear implant, audio induction loop, FM system, hearing aids. OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to explore factors contributing to assistive technology abandonment among deaf individuals who use sign language within the deaf community and those who use spoken language. METHODS: A non-experimental, cross-sectional, correlational design was used for the study. A semi-structured interview guide in the form of an ad hoc questionnaire containing 10 questions based on the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health. The study was carried out in Salamanca (Spain) in the association SADAP (Association of Postlocution Hearing Loss People) and CCSS (Salamanca Cultural Center for the Deaf). RESULTS: A total of 36 people participated in the study: 6 deaf people, 9 hearing loss people, 8 relatives and 13 professionals. CONCLUSIONS: The most common factors leading to assistive technology abandonment among deaf and hearing-impaired individuals include negative perceptions of the product, malfunction issues, high maintenance costs, insufficient training, and the stigma associated with its use. SIGNIFICANCE: There is a scarcity of studies within occupational therapy focusing on individuals with hearing loss, particularly those who communicate through sign language. This population often faces activity limitations and participation restrictions. While assistive products and technologies can enhance their daily functioning, negative factors that result in abandonment or discontinuation of use remain significant concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Martha's Vineyard Sign Language (MVSL) is an extinct village sign language hypothesized to be a sister of British Sign Language (BSL) and a significant contributor to early American Sign Language (ASL) (Groce 1985). After the last deaf MVSL signer died, signs were elicited from five hearing signers. This study analyzes that data through a series of lexicostatistical comparisons following methodology from Woodward (1978) and Guerra Currie, Meier, and Walters (2002). The results show that a sample of 711 MVSL signs is 67 percent similar to ASL, 74 percent similar to Old ASL (OASL), 56 percent similar to Old French Sign Language (OLSF), and 59 percent similar to BSL. Subsequent etymological analysis suggests that most signs shared by ASL and MVSL originated in Old LSF or ASL, and that signs shared with BSL likely came through ASL to MVSL, not the reverse. This suggests that MVSL did not play a large role in shaping early ASL; however, MVSL data may still be useful in reconstructing OASL. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The digital library is the most widely used source of legal information. However, libraries in India do not fulfill their obligation to provide the deaf population with the necessary legal information and support. Libraries need to investigate different kinds of assistive technology, which could be a beneficial way to give the deaf population access to important legal information resources and help them deal with the problem. This article addresses the legal issues and challenges faced by the deaf population, the role of Indian sign language (ISL) interpreters in providing legal assistance, and the disadvantages of ISL interpreters in the legal system when providing legal services to the deaf population. To overcome the issues and challenges, this article focuses on the design and development of the ISL Legal Digital Library to support the deaf and the legal system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expression of thoughts and feelings through communication plays a major part of human life in building relationship among others. Most of the population with hearing ability expresses their thoughts in their own or known language through voice-oriented communication. The people belonging to deaf-mute community uses hand movement gestures and expressions of face for communication which is called sign language. There exists a difficulty in building a conversation between the hearing community and non-hearing community. To make easy conversation of deaf-mute people with the external world and to connect the gap for communication between the hearing people and non-hearing people, we developed an interpreter that translates sign language to text. Most system developed for the recognition of Indian Sign Language is built for alphabets and numbers. We attempted in building a model for 15 meaningful short sentences of Indian sign gestures using, custom built video datasets captured using OpenCV, keypoints of hands, pose and face extracted using MediaPipe. The model is trained using LSTM and achieved training and testing accuracy of 99.17% and 97.78% respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present, the development of animation-based works for human–computer interaction applications has increased. To generate animations, actions are pre-recorded and animation flows are configured. In this research, from two images of letters of the sign language alphabet, intermediate frames were generated using a numerical traced algorithm based on homotopy. The parameters of a homotopy curve were optimized with a genetic algorithm to generate intermediate frames. In the experiments performed, sequences where a person executes pairs of letters in sign language were recorded and animations of the same pairs of letters were generated with the proposed method. Subsequently, the similarity of the real sequences to the animations was measured using Dynamic Time Wrapping. The results obtained show that the images obtained are consistent with their execution by a person. Animation files between sign pairs were created from sign images, with each file weighing an average of 18.3 KB. By having sequences between pairs of letters it is possible to animate words and sentences. The animations generated by this homotopy-based animation method optimized with a genetic algorithm can be used in various deaf interaction applications to provide assistance. From several pairs of letters a file base was generated using the animations between pairs of letters; with these files you can create animations of words and sentences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Facultad de Ingeniería - UPTC is the property of Universidad Pedagogica y Tecnologica de Colombia, Facultad de Ingenieria and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Abstract\nPoints of InterestThis research aims to define and identify the characteristics of hearing culture in the United States, particularly in contrast to Deaf culture. Through three focus group interviews with 18 participants from different backgrounds, including deaf individuals with both deaf and hearing parents, as well as hearing individuals affiliated with the Deaf community, key themes emerged. These themes included defining cultures, audiovocal orientation, mixed spaces, negotiating one’s role as a hearing person, perception, development of hearing identity, and orientation. This study seeks to shed light on the ways in which hearing individuals navigate the world with their primary senses of listening and speaking, in contrast to deaf individuals who rely on vision and touch. Ultimately, this research aims to provide a better understanding of the complexities of cultural dynamics between the hearing and Deaf worlds. Ultimately, a definition of hearing culture emerged from the data.This article used a grounded theory approach with three focus groups to define the larger hearing (non-deaf) culture in the United States by analyzing it in the context of the smaller Deaf culture.Deaf and hearing individuals rely on different senses to navigate the world which frequently leads to cultural conflicts.Hearing culture often perceives deafness as a disability or something that needs to be ‘fixed’ so that deaf people can hear and speak like hearing people.Hearing culture holds significant power and influence over how deaf individuals navigate the hearing world.Hearing people are often ignorant of their own hearing status, position of power, biases, what it means to be hearing, and their collective impact on deaf individuals.This article used a grounded theory approach with three focus groups to define the larger hearing (non-deaf) culture in the United States by analyzing it in the context of the smaller Deaf culture.Deaf and hearing individuals rely on different senses to navigate the world which frequently leads to cultural conflicts.Hearing culture often perceives deafness as a disability or something that needs to be ‘fixed’ so that deaf people can hear and speak like hearing people.Hearing culture holds significant power and influence over how deaf individuals navigate the hearing world.Hearing people are often ignorant of their own hearing status, position of power, biases, what it means to be hearing, and their collective impact on deaf individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined deaf learners' academic and social difficulties as well as their coping mechanisms in Ethiopian elementary schools. To do this, the study adopted a phenomenological design from qualitative research methodology. Purposive sampling methods were used to choose nine deaf students for semi-structured interviews. Using word-by-word narrative analysis, data were analyzed. The lack of sign language interpreters and teachers' exclusionary behaviors were found to be some of the academic and social obstacles faced by deaf learners in the research area. The study also found that deaf learners in participating schools used problem-focused coping techniques, including pen-and-paper techniques for interpersonal communication, and maladaptive coping mechanisms like ignoring and social withdrawal. According to the report, local authorities should organize awareness workshops for instructors from participating schools on how to instruct deaf learners in inclusive environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hearing impairment among adults with intellectual disability (ID) is notably prevalent yet frequently underdiagnosed due, in part, to the challenges associated with traditional hearing screening methods in this population. This study explores the effectiveness of the Digit-in-Noise (DIN) test as a viable alternative for hearing screening within natural settings and with familiar personnel. A total of 16 Hebrew-speaking adults with ID were recruited from supported employment programs, 10 of whom completed the study. The DIN test, which was administered in a daily environment using a simple digital device, evaluated the speech recognition threshold in noise. Results indicated that while some participants performed comparably to typically developing individuals, others showed varying levels of hearing thresholds, suggesting diverse auditory capabilities within the ID population. This pilot study confirms that the DIN test can be feasibly integrated into routine care settings, offering a friendly and accessible method for assessing hearing abilities in adults with ID. The findings advocate for the broader adoption of and potential modifications to the DIN Test to enhance its applicability and inclusiveness, thereby improving diagnostic accuracy and subsequent auditory care for this underserved population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Automatic conversion of sign language into text or speech can be really useful in communicating among deaf or mute people with no sign language knowledge. The present need is to create an automated system that can translate ISL signals into regular text and vice versa. It is advantageous for both groups to communicate their needs to one another while using publicly accessible services, such as banking, traffic signaling, and ticketing. In this manuscript, Indian Sign Language Recognition using Transfer Learning with Efficient Net (ISLR-EfficientNetB0) is proposed for Indian sign language recognition. Initially, the input images are gathered via the Indian Sign Language (ISL) dataset. The input image is pre-processing by Fairness-aware Collaborative Filtering (FACF) method. In pre-processing stage noise are removed from input images and image resizing is done. Then, Efficient Net B0 is employed to identify ISL. The proposed model is implemented on Python. Then the efficiency of the proposed approach is compared with existing models. The accuracy, precision, specificity, sensitivity, F1-score, computational time, error rate and RoC of the suggested approaches are all assessed. The proposed ISLR-EfficientNetB0 method attains 31.42%, 26.04%, and 20.45% higher accuracy, 19.24%, 26.35%, and 24.02% higher precision, 15.84%, 18.91%, and 28.16% higher specificity and 17.06%, 21.36%, and 32.47% higher sensitivity compared with existing methods, such as Indian sign language recognition under machine learning methods (ISLR-KNN), ISL recognition scheme utilizing SURF with SVM and CNN (ISLR-SVM-CNN) and Benchmarking deep neural network methods for ISL recognition (ISLR-VGG16) respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deaf people use visual language and communication strategies naturally. Moreover, hearing people (both young children and adults) can also benefit from sign language and the visual strategies that deaf parents and teachers use with young children, an example of deaf gain. This paper will provide an overview of the concept of deaf gain, review previous research on deaf parents' visual strategies for interacting with young deaf children, and suggest ways for professionals and hearing parents with young children to integrate these visual strategies. We will also discuss the research-based visual strategies used by deaf adults and teachers outlined in a tip sheet from the Deaf Leadership International Alliance (DLIA), with examples from two popular curricula used by early intervention: the SKI-HI Deaf Mentor Program and ASL at Home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Text descriptions in museums provide detailed and rich information about artifacts that broadens museum visitors' knowledge and enriches their experience. However, since deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) individuals have low literacy compared to hearing people and communicate through sign language, museum descriptions are considerably limited in delivering a stimulating and informative environment for understanding and enjoying exhibits. To improve DHH individuals' museum experience, we investigated the potential of three interactive description prototypes: active-linked, graph-based, and chatbot-based. A comparative study with 20 DHH participants confirmed that our interaction-based prototypes improve information accessibility and provide an enhanced experience compared to conventional museum descriptions. Most participants preferred the graph-based prototype, while post-interviews suggested that each prototype has potential benefits and limitations according to DHH individuals' particular literacy skills and preferences. Text descriptions can be enlivened for DHH visitors by adding a simple interaction functionality, e.g., clicking, which can lead to a better museum experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous nations have prioritised the inclusion of citizens with disabilities, such as hearing loss, in all aspects of social life. Sign language is used by this population, yet they still have trouble communicating with others. Many sign language apps are being created to help bridge the communication gap as a result of technology advances enabled by the widespread use of smartphones. These apps are widely used because they are accessible and inexpensive. The services and capabilities they offer and the quality of their content, however, differ greatly. Evaluation of the quality of the content provided by these applications is necessary if they are to have any kind of real effect. A thorough evaluation like this will inspire developers to work hard on new apps, which will lead to improved software development and experience overall. This research used a systematic literature review (SLR) method, which is recognised in gaining a broad understanding of the study whilst offering additional information for future investigations. SLR was adopted in this research for smartphone-based sign language apps to understand the area and main discussion aspects utilised in the assessment. These studies were reviewed on the basis of related work analysis, main issues, discussions and methodological aspects. Results revealed that the evaluation of sign language mobile apps is scarce. Thus, we proposed a future direction for the quality assessment of these apps. The findings will benefit normal-hearing and hearing-impaired users and open up a new area where researchers and developers could work together on sign language mobile apps. The results will help hearing and non-hearing users and will pave the way for future collaboration between academicians and app developers in the field of sign language technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on contemporary texts, the paper presents in detail the course and results of the discussions on educational methods and the use of sign language in institutes for the deaf and dumb in Bohemia and Moravia in the first half of the 20th century. The discussions were participated in by prominent educators, other personalities, and the deaf themselves. It fo- cuses in particular on the moments when the voices of the opponents of oral methods, which were uniformly preferred in deaf education, were becoming stronger and presents the most frequent arguments for and against their use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The deaf group are people who have hearing impairments. They are mukalaf who are obliged to carry out the commands of Allah SWT. Even though they are deaf, they have the right to study the Quran. One of the methods used to learn recitation is the hand code of the Quran. Therefore, the objective of this study is to identify the challenges faced by deaf people in learning to recite the Quran using the Quran Hand Sign Code. This case study used a qualitative approach through semistructured interviews with five deaf people in Selangor. The data were transcribed before being coded thematically using the Nvivo 10 software. Among the challenges faced by deaf people in learning to recite the Quran using the hand code are the lack of communication skills of teachers who teach using Malaysian Sign Language, difficulty remembering and understanding hand code Quran and the difficulty of finding Quran teachers who are skilled in teaching the deaf. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sign language is a form of communication that helps deaf and mute people interact with those who can hear. In the country, around 2.78% of people are unable to speak, i.e., are mute or deaf. Their primary means of communication is through hand motions and gestures. The paper proposes a new technique called the "artificial speaking mouth" for individuals with speech impairments. Humans connect with each other through thoughts and ideas, but some people lack the ability to speak. For them, sign language is the only means of communication. Nowadays, technology has reduced this communication gap with systems that translate sign language into speech. Sign Language Recognition (SLR) and gesture-based control are two major applications used for hand gesture recognition technologies. On the other hand, the controller converts sign language into text and speech, using text-to-speech conversion and analog-to-digital conversion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This qualitative study examines deaf people’s lived experiences of ableism and discrimination in mainstream and special school settings. Through the lens of critical disability studies theory, the researcher conducted semi-structured individual interviews with 13 deaf adult individuals in Ireland who self-reported experiencing ableism and discrimination in school. Interviews were thematically analysed resulting in the generation of four themes on the different ways in which the study participants experienced ableism in school contexts and the consequences of this ableism on their education. The themes are: denial of opportunities to learn and use Irish Sign Language (ISL); ableist barriers to accessing incidental learning; deaf teachers; and the ableism of low expectations. The findings demonstrate that attitudinal barriers to accessing ISL in the classroom negatively impacted on deaf people’s social and educational lives. The findings highlight the need to ensure human rights are at the core of deaf education policy.

Sign Language Recognition (SLR) helps deaf people communicate with normal people. However, SLR still has difficulty detecting dynamic movements of connected sign language, which reduces the accuracy of detection. This results from a sentence's usage of transitional gestures between words. Several researchers have tried to solve the problem of transition gestures in dynamic sign language, but none have been able to produce an accurate solution. The R-GB LSTM method detects transition gestures within a sentence based on labelled words and transition gestures stored in a model. If a gesture to be processed during training matches a transition gesture stored in the pre-training process and its probability value is greater than 0.5, it is categorized as a transition gesture. Subsequently, the detected gestures are eliminated according to the gesture's time value (t). To evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed method, we conducted an experiment using 20 words in Indonesian Sign Language (SIBI). Twenty representative words were selected for modelling using our R-GB LSTM technique. The results are promising, with an average accuracy of 80% for gesture sentences and an even more impressive accuracy rate of 88.57% for gesture words. We used a confusion matrix to calculate accuracy, specificity, and sensitivity. This study marks a significant leap forward in developing sustainable sign language recognition systems with improved accuracy and practicality. This advancement holds great promise for enhancing communication and accessibility for deaf and hard-of-hearing communities.

Since the early 2000's, digital reading applications have enhanced the language and literacy skills of typically hearing young children; however, no digital storybook intervention currently exists to scaffold the early language and literacy skills of their peers who are deaf or hard of hearing. To address this gap, our research team developed a novel digital storybook intervention called Hear Me Read with the aim of enhancing the therapeutic, language, and literacy benefits of speech-language therapy. This prospective clinical trial (registered at clinicaltrials.gov, NCT#: 05245799) aims to determine the efficacy of adding Hear Me Read to in-person speech-language therapy for children aged three to five years who are deaf or hard of hearing. Fifty caregivers, their child, and their child's treating speech-language pathologist participate in the trial for 12 months. In the first six months, children attend standard-of-care speech-language therapy sessions. In the second six months, children continue to attend standard-of-care speech-language therapy sessions and use the Hear Me Read application, via a study supplied iPad. The primary outcome of this trial is that, compared to in-person speech-language therapy alone, in-person speech-language therapy with Hear Me Read will improve vocabulary, speech, and language outcomes in children aged three to five years who are deaf or hard of hearing. The secondary outcome is that, compared to in-person speech-language therapy alone, in-person speech-language therapy with Hear Me Read will improve literacy outcomes in children aged three to five years who are deaf or hard of hearing. The goal of this intervention is to help children who are deaf or hard of hearing achieve their vocabulary, speech, language, and literacy goals through interactive digital storybook reading. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of deafness on visual attention has been widely discussed in previous research. It has been noted that deficiencies and strengths of previous research can be attributed to temporal or spatial aspects of attention, as well as variations in development and clinical characteristics. Visual attention is categorized into three networks: orienting (exogenous and endogenous), alerting (phasic and tonic), and executive control. This study aims to contribute new neuroscientific evidence supporting this hypothesis. This paper presents a systematic review of the international literature from the past 15 years focused on visual attention in the deaf population. The final review included 24 articles. The function of the orienting network is found to be enhanced in deaf adults and children, primarily observed in native signers without cochlear implants, while endogenous orienting is observed only in the context of gaze cues in children, with no differences found in adults. Results regarding alerting and executive function vary depending on clinical characteristics and paradigms used. Implications for future research on visual attention in the deaf population are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Deaf and hard-of-hearing people mainly communicate using sign language, which is a set of signs made using hand gestures combined with facial expressions to make meaningful and complete sentences. The problem that faces deaf and hard-of-hearing people is the lack of automatic tools that translate sign languages into written or spoken text, which has led to a communication gap between them and their communities. Most state-of-the-art vision-based sign language recognition approaches focus on translating non-Arabic sign languages, with few targeting the Arabic Sign Language (ArSL) and even fewer targeting the Saudi Sign Language (SSL). This paper proposes a mobile application that helps deaf and hard-of-hearing people in Saudi Arabia to communicate efficiently with their communities. The prototype is an Android-based mobile application that applies deep learning techniques to translate isolated SSL to text and audio and includes unique features that are not available in other related applications targeting ArSL. The proposed approach, when evaluated on a comprehensive dataset, has demonstrated its effectiveness by outperforming several state-of-the-art approaches and producing results that are comparable to these approaches. Moreover, testing the prototype on several deaf and hard-of-hearing users, in addition to hearing users, proved its usefulness. In the future, we aim to improve the accuracy of the model and enrich the application with more features. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]