Cochlear Ear Implant Controversy
By: Mykayla Boyd & Kali Magee
The Story Behind Cochlear Ear Implants
Since the beginning of its creation, the cochlear ear implant has improved the lives of deaf people and the hearing impaired. However there has been much contradiction regarding the outcome affect of the cochlear ear implant. Society thinks that cochlear ear implants have provided a sense of auditorial hearing aid, but in truth, it has decreased the use of sign language and forced the majority of deaf people to fit in, disrupting the feeling of normalcy within society.
What is and Who Created Cochlear Ear Implants?
A cochlear ear implant is a small, electronic device that can help to provide a sense of sound for people who are profoundly deaf or suffer hard of hearing severely. In 1978, a man named Graeme Clark had successfully invented the first cochlear ear implant and used a patient named Rod Saunders as the first recipient.
Hearing and CI's
The general population of deaf people that recieve CI's are born into a hearing family or become deaf after being hearing for a long period of time. For those individuals that are born deaf, the hearing parents for the majority see their hearing as a defect. Therefore feeling the need to "fix" them. Believing that CI's have the power to restore all hearing to their child and allowing them to grow up as hearing and interact normally in the hearing world.
Hearing Cochlear Implants w/ open captions
We Believe.....
In the deaf community, although, see CI's as monstrosities. To a most deaf individuals they are proud of being deaf. Hence the saying, "Deaf Pride". They see it as there is no reason for them to be fixed because they are not broken. So not only do we view CI's in a negative way because of this factor but also because of the medical issues that can be involved in the procedure of getting one. You have over a million hair file clues in your inner ear and the CI only replaces about twenty seven of those. You do not hear normally, but electronically. It is a machine. They drill into your head to access your inner ear and stick a magnet attached to it underneath your skin. If the individual receiving the implant has any hearing whatsoever that hearing is destroyed with the procedure making them a hundred percent deaf. They also can cause blood blockage, and strokes, and there have been times were individuals have died during the procedure or have had permanent face paralysis because of a destruction of a nerve that is located close to the place of insertion.
The Deaf Community
With the sudden outbreak of CI's although, it is causing the deaf community to decrease. Most people who receive the CI's if they know ASL, drop it because to them there is no reason to use it anymore. So it is also threatening the deaf and eventually if CI's get big enough, ASL as a language will become extinct.