Princess Diana learned British Signing Language

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By JFLMad

Transcript:

Today is the 10th anniversary death of Princess Diana.

I want to inform you the history about Princess Diana involved with the deaf culture.

In 1983, Princess Diana joined BDA (British Deaf Association) to become their patron and learned the BSL (British Signing Language). She was campaigning in landmines for the Red Cross and met Mike Whitlam. Both of them know the BSL and became good friends.

Years later until 1992, Princess Diana captured the headlines by launching the Sign Language dictionary with a presentation in BSL. She often made the trips visiting the deaf schools. In that span, she influenced over 15,000 people to take the sign language classes.

She’s the only one out of the royal family that knows the BSL!

P.S. After some more research and from Fookem/JFLMad’s parents (they visited England few years ago), we found out that Princess Alice (Prince Philip’s mother) was diagnosed with congenital deafness. We are not too sure if she knew some form of the sign languages.

Excerpt from wikipedia.org:

Princess Alice spent her childhood between Darmstadt, London, Jugenheim, and Malta (where her naval officer father was occasionally stationed). Her mother noticed that she was slow in learning to talk, and became concerned by her indistinct pronunciation. Eventually, Princess Alice was diagnosed with congenital deafness after her grandmother identified the problem and took her to see an ear specialist. With encouragement from her mother, Alice learned to both lip-read and speak in English and German. Educated privately, she studied French, and later, after her engagement, she learned Greek.

Folk dance performance by Deaf and Hard of Hearing group from Shenyang

This is a rare glimpse of a folk dance performance by Deaf and Hard of Hearing people in Shenyang, China. The dance is called ‘Yang Ge’. 

 

Pathologist: Doctor killed Beethoven

This is an undated sketch of German composer Ludwig van Beethoven. Beethoven was born in Bonn on Dec. 17, 1770 and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. Viennese forensic expert Christian Reiter claims it was the famed composer’s physician who inadvertently overdosed him with lead, in a case of a cure that went wrong. He says the new analysis shows that in the last few months of Beethoven’s life, lead concentrations in his body spiked every time he was treated by his doctor, Andreas Wawruch for fluid inside the abdomen. Those lethal doses permeated his already sick liver, ultimately killing him, he told The Associated Press. (AP Photo)

VIENNA, Austria – Did someone kill Beethoven? A Viennese pathologist claims the composer’s physician did — inadvertently overdosing him with lead in a case of a cure that went wrong.

Other researchers are not convinced, but there is no controversy about one fact: The master had been a very sick man years before his death in 1827.

Previous research determined that Beethoven had suffered from lead poisoning, first detecting toxic levels of the metal in his hair and then, two years ago, in bone fragments. Those findings strengthened the belief that lead poisoning may have contributed — and ultimately led — to his death at age 57.

But Viennese forensic expert Christian Reiter claims to know more after months of painstaking work applying CSI-like methods to strands of Beethoven’s hair.

He says his analysis, published last week in the Beethoven Journal, shows that in the final months of the composer’s life, lead concentrations in his body spiked every time he was treated by his doctor, Andreas Wawruch, for fluid inside the abdomen. Those lethal doses permeated Beethoven’s ailing liver, ultimately killing him, Reiter told The Associated Press.

“His death was due to the treatments by Dr. Wawruch,” said Reiter, head of the Department of Forensic Medicine at Vienna’s Medical University. “Although you cannot blame Dr. Wawruch — how was he to know that Beethoven already had a serious liver ailment?”

Nobody did back then.

Only through an autopsy after the composer’s death in the Austrian capital on March 26, 1827, were doctors able to establish that Beethoven suffered from cirrhosis of the liver as well as edemas of the abdomen. Reiter says that in attempts to ease the composer’s suffering, Wawruch repeatedly punctured the abdominal cavity — and then sealed the wound with a lead-laced poultice.

Although lead’s toxicity was known even then, the doses contained in a treatment balm “were not poisonous enough to kill someone if he would have been healthy,” Reiter said. “But what Dr. Wawruch clearly did not know that his treatment was attacking an already sick liver, killing that organ.”

Even before the edemas developed, Wawruch noted in his diary that he treated an outbreak of pneumonia months before Beethoven’s death with salts containing lead, which aggravated what researchers believe was an existing case of lead poisoning.

But, said Reiter, it was the repeated doses of the lead-containing cream, administered by Wawruch in the last weeks of Beethoven’s life, that did in the composer.

Analysis of several hair strands showed “several peaks where the concentration of lead rose pretty massively” on the four occasions between Dec. 5, 1826, and Feb. 27, 1827, when Beethoven himself documented that he had been treated by Wawruch for the edema, said Reiter. “Every time when his abdomen was punctured … we have an increase of the concentration of lead in the hair.”

Such claims intrigue others who have researched the issue.

“His data strongly suggests that Beethoven was subjected to significant lead exposures over the last 111 days of his life and that this lead may have been in the very medicines applied by his doctor,” said Bill Walsh, who led the team at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory outside Chicago that found large amounts of lead in Beethoven’s bone fragments. That research two years ago confirmed the cause of years of debilitating disease that likely led to his death — but did not tie his demise to Wawruch.

“I believe that Beethoven’s death may have been caused by this application of lead-containing medicines to an already severely lead-poisoned man,” Walsh said.

Still, he added, samples from hair analysis are not normally considered as reliable as from bone, which showed high levels of lead concentration over years, instead of months.

With hair, “you have the issue of contamination from outside material, shampoos, residues, weathering problems. The membranes on the outside of the hair tend to deteriorate,” he said, suggesting more research is needed on the exact composition of the medications given Beethoven in his last months of his life.

As for what caused the poisoning even before Wawruch’s treatments, some say it was the lead-laced wine Beethoven drank. Others speculate that as a young man he drank water with high concentrations of lead at a spa.

“We still don’t know the ultimate cause,” Reiter said. “But he was a very sick man — for years before his death.”

The Beethoven Journal is published by the Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies at San Jose State University in California.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070828/ap_en_ot/who_killed_beethoven

Defying deafness

By ELAINE WONG.

A young woman has shown that being hearing impaired is no barrier when it comes to pursuing one’s dreams. 

ENERGETIC and vivacious, Eng Foong Mei certainly does not come across as disabled, not until she begins to sign animatedly and her face lights up with an array of expressions as she conveys her thoughts and feelings.  

Born hearing-impaired, the 21-year-old Mei Mei, as she is affectionately known, has not allowed deafness to stop her from pursuing her dream of studying overseas. 

“Many parents of the deaf do not send their children abroad for studies because they are afraid the deaf won’t be able to cope. I am thankful that my family, mentor and friends were very supportive of my dream to study in Canada,” she says. 

While admitting to a tinge of fear going into a whole new environment, Mei Mei also recalls a clear sense of excitement when she first landed on Canadian soil in August last year. 

“I was thrilled to start my new life in a foreign land, but I was also very grateful that my mother and my mentor, (sign language interpreter) Lucy Lim, came along to help me settle in.” 

Mei Mei stays with a host family in Edmonton, Canada. Both husband and wife are also deaf, and in them, the young Malaysian has found role models – Rob Cundy is a retired school teacher whilst his wife, Linda, is a deaf advocate.  

And, of course, staying with the couple definitely has its perks. 

“When I encounter problems with my college work, I just approach them for help. It is very convenient!” says the former student of SM Sultan Abdul Samad in Petaling Jaya and youngest of three siblings. 

Studying in Canada has been quite a different experience for Mei Mei, who has completed her first year of Disability Studies at the Grant MacEwan Community College in Edmonton.  

“I really enjoy studying here. It was hard for me in Malaysia, not having interpreters for Forms Four and Five,” she says. 

“At this college, I have two interpreters who accompany me to every class and student activity.”  

She also points out that the focus is different from what it is in Malaysia, where “we study primarily to pass exams.” 

“In Canada, I actually enjoy the whole process of learning. I am able to relate the things I study to what is happening in real life.  

“We have lecturers who are highly experienced in their fields, and we also have practicums where we work with the blind and the physically disabled. This makes the whole learning process fun and interesting,” she adds. 

Disability Studies at the college is a two-year diploma course that focuses on integrating the disabled into the community. Subjects include advocacy and communication, and leadership skills as well as nutrition, health and fitness.  

So far, Mei Mei has completed subjects on the mentally challenged, the physically handicapped and those with learning disabilities.  

She is confident that the knowledge she is getting will enable her to help the disabled community in Malaysia when she returns home. 

Checking out a snow mobile in Salt Lake City, Utah, the United States, is one of the many new things Mei Mei has done since leaving home to study in Canada.

Even before completing the programme, Mei Mei is already quite an advocate for the deaf and an ambassador for Malaysia in her own right.  

She presented a talk on “Deaf Education in Malaysia” at the University of Alberta in February and spoke on “Challenges of the Deaf in Malaysia” at the University of Vancouver earlier this month.  

She also presented the song To Know Malaysia Is To Love Malaysia at the 55th Edmonton Association of the Deaf Banquet last year.  

When she is not busy studying, Mei Mei volunteers with the Alberta School for the Deaf in Edmonton, where she works as a teacher’s aide in elementary classes and helps out in the library.  

But life isn’t all work and no play for this bubbly personality.  

Just like every student who leaves home for the first time, Mei Mei finds delight in the freedom of living away from her family. 

“Everything is so new and interesting for me. I am learning how to cook, how to budget my expenses and how to take public transportation.  

“In Malaysia, our maid does all the cooking and my mother drives me wherever I need to go. Here I have to do everything on my own.” 

However, she adds, learning new things has not been difficult despite her hearing impairment. 

“The easy availability of a wide array of facilities for the disabled in my college and in the whole of Canada gives me a sense of freedom and independence that I did not have in Malaysia.  

“In Canada, I am able to exercise more control over how I study and live my life.” 

One such facility is the Video Relay Service provided by the government. The deaf can request for any service at all via a decoder attached to their television. Ordering a pizza, making a telephone call, and so on can then be done through an interpreter. 

Mei Mei once used it to contact her parents and gave them a real shock because the interpreter that day was a man.  

“He called and said: ‘Hi, Dad! I am Mei Mei.’ My father hung up the phone on the poor interpreter! But this service makes it so convenient for the deaf because we can do everything without depending on hearing people all the time.” 

Adapting to the different seasons in Canada has been another experience. She was exhilarated when she saw her first snowflakes, but her excitement did wane a little when it wouldn’t stop snowing for six months. 

“I do love winter sports though. I went skiing and tobogganing with my host family. Initially I didn’t know how to ski, so I fell and hurt my knees and bum many times. I did much better by the end of winter and now, I can’t wait for the next winter to perfect my skills,” she says with zeal. 

Christmas and Thanksgiving are turning out to be Mei Mei’s favourite times of the year in Canada. She loves the sense of family togetherness during these events, not to mention the food served.  

She recounts with relish her first taste of stuffed turkey, adding that she reciprocated in the exchange of cultures by whipping up some popular Malaysian fare for her host family during Chinese New Year.  

Having spent a year in Edmonton, Mei Mei has this bit of advice for deaf students who wish to pursue their studies abroad: “First, you need to be mature, and then, you need to have a clear sense of direction.  

“You must also have a good foundation in sign language.”  

She urges parents of the deaf to consider sending their children overseas because they will have more options compared with what is on offer in Malaysia.  

“Every college provides interpreters for a nominal fee, so the deaf can choose any course they wish to take. In my college, the disabled take courses in Behavourial Science, Special Education, Psychology, Graphic Design, Computer Studies and Business Studies.  

“Disability is no limitation at all.” 

Most importantly, Mei Mei believes that when deaf students complete their courses, they should return home.  

“It is tempting to stay on in a foreign land because the facilities and working opportunities are better, but Malaysia also needs your expertise and knowledge.  

“If you do not come back, it will be a great loss to the nation.”  

http://thestar.com.my/education/story.asp?file=/2007/8/26/education/18657901

Killed for trying to help his deaf pal

The scene where David Hayes was murdered

A reveller celebrating his 21st birthday has become the latest victim of Britain’s knife culture after he was stabbed to death for helping his deaf friend.

David Haynes was attacked outside a kebab shop after he tried to stop a group of bullies taunting his friend, it was claimed.

He was knifed in the stomach and staggered across the street, lifted his top and pointed to the wound.

Mr Haynes, whose brother is also disabled, was taken to hospital but died during surgery. Afriend said last night: ‘He stood up to these yobs because he knew what they were doing wasn’t right. But he paid the ultimate price.’

The stabbing happened in the early hours of Sunday morning in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire.

Barmaid Sabrina Grant, 21, described how Mr Haynes came staggering across the street towards her.

She said: ‘He lifted up his T-shirt and pointed to the middle of his stomach where he had been stabbed and said “Look”. There was blood everywhere.’

Yesterday floral tributes piled up at the spot where Mr Haynes was stabbed. A note on one bouquet read: ‘Why? Another heartless killing. When will this stop?’

Three men have been arrested and charged with Mr Haynes’s murder.

His death was the latest in a series of seemingly senseless murders. Yesterday, the Everton football team laid flowers at the place where 11-year-old Rhys Jones was shot dead in Liverpool.

On Sunday, three people were charged with the murder in Sunderland of 23-year-old Brent Martin, who had learning difficulties.

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?in_article_id=63563&in_page_id=34

Deaf and mute murder suspect prepares for defense

 By the Associated PressWILLIAMSBURG, Va. (AP) — A judge on Monday ordered a deaf and mute illegal immigrant charged with raping and killing a teenager transferred from a hospital where he has been learning sign language for two years to a jail so he can prepare his defense.

Oswaldo Martinez, 36, of El Salvador, was charged in the January 2005 slaying of 16-year-old Brittany Binger. He was found incompetent to stand trial in September 2005 because of his language deficiencies and inability to communicate with his attorneys; when he was arrested, Martinez had no communication skills except for a few primitive hand signals.

Martinez’ case is reviewed every six months, and he was found incompetent each of the three times he came before the court. His case is up for review again in November.

Martinez was ordered to undergo sign language therapy at Western State Hospital in Staunton in an effort to allow him to understand the charges against him and assist in his defense. Part of his treatment involved watching the television show “Law and Order,” which is interpreted through sign language.

On Monday, Circuit Judge Samuel Powell ordered Martinez transferred to Virginia Peninsula Regional Jail so that he can have more contact with his attorneys, Timothy Clancy and Edward Webb. Powell also appointed a sign-language interpreter to work with Martinez and his attorneys.

“Western State was tasked with teaching him sign language — they have done that,” Williamsburg-James City County Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Nate Green said. “They have given him communication skills. Anybody that knows sign language can communicate with Mr. Martinez.”

Martinez is charged with rape, murder, sodomy and robbery in connection with Binger’s death. Investigators believe the teen was jumped from behind near the entrance to a mobile home park on Jan. 2, 2005, then raped and killed.

Binger’s body was found near an abandoned shed where Martinez had lived. Martinez’ DNA was found under the teenager’s fingernails, police have said.

If convicted, Martinez could face the death penalty.

http://www.delmarvanow.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070827/NEWS01/70827040/1002

Hearing impaired woman suing Station Casinos over accident

A Las Vegas woman is taking Station Casinos to court after an accident that injured her hands and wrists. The woman, who is hearing impaired, says she’s having a tough time communicating.

News 3’s Marie Mortera takes a look at the case and why this isn’t just about compensation.

Lena Morreale has no problem sharing her story. It’s the act of telling it that can get difficult. Through an interpreter, she says she has a pain that doesn’t just sting, it devastates because it has changed her life completely. It was only about 5 years ago when she was picking up her car at Texas Station valet.

“I saw this truck,” Morreale explains. It was speeding, then on the surveillance tape you can see the valet driver make a quick u-turn. “I tried to push away and it hit me and I screamed. He said ‘I’m sorry, I’m not paying attention to you being there. I’m very sorry.’”

But she says the apologetic note the valet left wasn’t enough to make up for what she’s lost: a job as a typist and, more importantly, part of her ability to communicate. “I need my hands, that’s my livelihood, that’s my life. Everything is right there.”

“If you cut off use of hands, wrists, it’s like cutting out their tongues,” Morreale’s attorney Marina Kolias said. Kolias says a settlement offered by Station Casinos isn’t enough. While she says she can’t get into the details for privacy concerns, she says cases like this one illustrate a problem that’s she seen more than once.

“It’s very difficult for the hearing world to understand that hand, wrist injury is just not that. It’s much more of their world,” Kolias said. “And for Morreale, it’s a world that won’t ever be the same. Her doctor has diagnosed her with arthritis that will likely worsen, as will her ability to do something so many take for granted.”

A representative for Station Casinos said they can’t comment on the ongoing case. It’s expected to go before a judge next month.

To view the video: http://www.kvbc.com/global/video/popup/pop_player.asp?ClipID1=1696218&h1=Hearing%20impaired%20woman%20suing%20Station%20Casinos%20over%20accident&vt1=v&at1=News&d1=127067&LaunchPageAdTag=News&activePane=info&playerVersion=1&hostPageUrl=http%3A//www.kvbc.com/Global/story.asp%3FS%3D6981067&rnd=27215560

http://www.kvbc.com/Global/story.asp?S=6981067

Police Search For Escaped Deaf Inmate

(KDKA) PITTSBURGH Police are searching for an escaped inmate today after he failed to return to the corrections center where he was being held.

Authorities identify the man as 39-year-old Bernard Davis, of the Hill District, who also goes by the name ‘Poochie.’

State police say Davis failed to return to the Riverside Community Corrections Center at a scheduled time Friday night.

Officials describe him as a black male, about 5’9” tall, weighing about 180 pounds, with brown eyes and tattoos on both his forearms.

Police say Davis is also deaf and uses sign language to communicate.

Officials say right now he is serving time for burglary charges.

(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

http://kdka.com/local/local_story_237103523.html

Diamond Encrusted, Solid 24K Hearing Aid only 50 Grand

This digital hearing aid from Widex.com is cast in solid 24-carat gold and encrusted with 220 diamonds. It’s £25,000, or $49,590. Who would buy it? You? [thanks to Jane Norman for the link]

Hurricane emergency information on CDC web site in ASL

CDC has posted some emergency information about hurricanes on their web site in American Sign Language (ASL).  

If you look at the chart of Public Service Announcements at the link below, you will see the topics that have ASL video clips (there will be a check mark in the ASL column). Click on that topic and then look to the right of the screen about halfway down and click on the ASL video for that topic.

Please forward this information to anyone you think might be interested. And please provide feedback for any videos you might watch. CDC needs your feedback to improve future videos in ASL.

You may post this link on any appropriate web site.

http://emergency.cdc.gov /disasters/hurricanes/psa.asp

-Danielle

Danielle S. Ross, Ph.D., M.Sc.
Early Hearing Detection & Intervention Program
Division of Human Development and Disabilities
National Center on Birth Defects & Developmental Disabilities
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
http://www.cdc.gov/ncbddd/ehdi /default.htm