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From: Jacqui Irwin
Date: 07 Oct 2009
Time: 08:49:18 -0500
Remote Name: 98.14.240.18
I am very interested in this article because I think that it really views the social issues of stuttering in a way that I have never considered to look at it before. I am a graduate student at New York University and am currently taking a class in Fluency Disorders and am wondering if we can discuss the three ways a phenomenon is demedicalized. First, I do agree that the present idea of stuttering harms the community by creating a stigma. In class we have discussed some of the challenges a person who stutters faces on a daily basis and I am quite positive that I do not even understand even half of how hard it is. Secondly, the point that says "treatments are not effective." While I know that there is no medical cure for stuttering (such as a medication), I do not understand what you mean by treatments as a whole are ineffective. I believe that with proper counseling and speech therapy steps can be taken to increase fluency. The speech therapy must be the type which works on decreasing tension, believes that stuttering is innate and not a learned concept, and which uses both indirect (structuring of the environment) and direct (fluency shaping techniques). While this type of speech therapy does not "cure" stuttering, it does increase fluency. So I am wondering, is speech therapy included in your model, or are you addressing medical treatments only? Lastly, the third point, "different terms of the phenomenon." I really like the idea of stuttering being classified in terms of anthropology, sociology and and social psychology. But I do think that the medical piece needs to be there. There are theories of etiology which say that genetics are a key component of the onset of stuttering. This is supported by the strong lines of familial history of stuttering. In addition to this, there is research being completed with which I am not completely familiar with, but is looking at the increased levels of dopamine in the brains of people who stutter and also studies are being completed to look at cerebral dominance differences through brain imaging studies. Again, how does this factor into the transfluency model? I believe that there are many important social aspects of fluency which are not addressed through current definitions of stuttering. I think that the transfluency model is very interesting and really focuses on the social aspects that are looked over by many professionals and the public. It truly addresses the issue that a person who stutters has an expressive communication problem. I am just wondering if you could please discuss how you would completely demedicalize stuttering which the current research that is going on today. Thank you very much for this article, I really enjoyed it.