Avoiding Insanity: AAC & the Pace of Change
Although the field of AAC emerged only in the last few decades, the notion of communicating in alternative ways is centuries old. In classical times, the use of manual communication by deaf individuals was referred to by Plato and documented in Europe during the Middle Ages. In North America, American Indian Hand Talk evolved over generations to allow cross-cultural communication between speakers of diverse languages. As a clinical/educational field, AAC has been described as evolving through a “bottom-up” mechanism. Individuals with congenital conditions that prevented the development of intelligible speech invented their own communication systems long before teachers, therapists, and clinicians formalized instruction in alternative modes of expression. AAC users growing up in the forties and fifties tell of communicating through grunts, vocalizations, “air writing,” and eye movements, which, though effective in some contexts, were maddening in their limitations. Individuals who were fortunate enough to have access to habilitative and... [Read More...]
Filed under: PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: advocacy, change, historical perspective, ideas
