Maryland Cued Speech Association

Cue Contact

                Allison Polk               

 

Connection to Cued Speech: Deaf cuer

 

Number of years cueing: 17

 

How did you learn to cue?: Picked up naturally, first from mom

 then the kids at school :-) Note: It wasn't through learning the 

hand shapes and the hand movements, but by learning new words 

and adding to my everyday vocabulary that my handle on English 

(and therefore cueing) improved. 

 

Describe what CS means to you or what effect it has had on your life.  Asking what cueing means to me almost seems like asking what being brunette means to me. It's been part of my life as long as I can remember, and it always will be. For that reason, I have a hard time distinguishing what I have as a result of cueing, but if nothing else, it's given me another avenue of communication - I can communicate in spoken English without writing it down or butchering sign language into something which is entirely inadequate for conveying English, something of which so many deaf people didn't (and don't) have a advantage. As a fourth-year student at Gallaudet, I sometimes feel

like I have two things many (but not all) of the students there don't: total bilingualism and cultural literacy.

 

What county do you live in? Currently, Anne Arundel, but by July, Montgomery County

 

Contact info: email address: intellipig@yahoo.com

(Cue Contact info. submitted June 14, 2001)