Anonymous
Posted October 11, 2003
I understood the context of the book however, I was immediately dissappointed with one of the part on page 4 in the book that talked of a woman reminiscing when she was 3 year old girl waking up crying and asking for her parents by yelling, 'Mamma, Daddy, why can't you hear me?...' I find that small part incredulous hard to believe because nearly all of our deaf friends' hearing children typically got out of the bed and went to the parent's bedroom to wake up the parents at an early age. Other than that, it was generally good.
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More About This Textbook
Overview
"Mother father deaf" is the phrase commonly used within the Deaf community to refer to hearing children of deaf parents. These children grow up between two cultures, the Hearing and the Deaf, forever balancing the worlds of sound and silence. Paul Preston, one of these children, takes us to the place where Deaf and Hearing cultures meet, where families like his own embody the conflicts and resolutions of two often opposing world views. Based on 150 interviews with adult hearing children of deaf parents throughout the United States, Mother Father Deaf examines the process of assimilation and cultural affiliation among a population whose lives incorporate the paradox of being culturally "Deaf" yet functionally hearing. It is rich in anecdote and analysis, remarkable for its insights into a family life normally closed to outsiders.
"Mother father deaf" is the phrase commonly used within the Deaf community to refer to hearing children of deaf parents. These children grow up between two cultures, the Hearing and the Deaf. The author is one of these children, and in this book based on 150 interviews, he takes us to the place where Deaf and Hearing cultures meet.
Editorial Reviews
Medical Anthropology Quarterly
Preston's findings are both interesting and important...[His] thoughtful and lucid account raises as many questions as it answers, and thus makes a significant contribution to the small but growing literature on deaf culture in particular and disability studies in general.
— Nora Ellen Groce
Contemporary Psychology
There is much more to the difference between being deaf and hearing than simply whether one hears or not. The two worlds are separate and different. Paul Preston offers us a unique view of those differences through his anthropological study of people who exist in both cultures, the hearing children of deaf parents...This book is informative and inviting...[Preston] provides a useful source of information for understanding the interactions between the hearing and deaf worlds.
— Charles V. Anderson
Booklist
Through stories, family histories, and sensitive questioning, Preston reveals what it feels like to stand astride the two cultural communities and offers new insights into the world of deafness.
Booklist
Through stories, family histories, and sensitive questioning, Preston reveals what it feels like to stand astride the two cultural communities and offers new insights into the world of deafness.Contemporary Psychology
There is much more to the difference between being deaf and hearing than simply whether one hears or not. The two worlds are separate and different. Paul Preston offers us a unique view of those differences through his anthropological study of people who exist in both cultures, the hearing children of deaf parents...This book is informative and inviting...[Preston] provides a useful source of information for understanding the interactions between the hearing and deaf worlds.— Charles V. Anderson
Medical Anthropology Quarterly
Preston's findings are both interesting and important...[His] thoughtful and lucid account raises as many questions as it answers, and thus makes a significant contribution to the small but growing literature on deaf culture in particular and disability studies in general.— Nora Ellen Groce
Product Details
Meet the Author
Paul Preston manages the recently created national Research and Training Center on Families of Adults with Disabilities, located at Through the Looking Glass, a nonprofit organization in Berkeley, California. He is also Research Associate in Medical Anthropology at the University of California, San Francisco.
Table of Contents
PART 1: WHEN CULTURES COLLIDE
1. Introduction
2. Interpreting Our Lives
PART 2: FAMILY ALBUMS
3. Invisible and Profound
4. Views from the Other Side
5. The Alternate Family
6. Imperfect Mirrors
PART 3: CHILDHOOD LANDSCAPES
7. A Song You Never Heard Before
8. Inside Out or Upside Down
9. The Heritage of Difference
10. Hyphenated Lives
PART 4: A DISTANT WORLD CALLED HOME
11. Identity on the Margins of Culture
Epilogue
Glossary
Notes
Reference
Acknowledgment
Index