Summary Of What's That Pig Outdoors

What’s that Pig Outdoors by Henry Kisor is both a dream and a nightmare. It is a book written by a deaf man, and self proclaimed to be for the deaf. Kisor’s autobiography takes the reader through his life, starting with the meningitis that caused him to be deaf at age 3, to his adult life as a journalist. In between, Kisor experiences some discrimination, such as not being allowed to be a lifeguard, but goes largely unopposed throughout his life. Kisor’s parents are very accepting, and fight hard for him to have the resources he needs. However, Kisor’s parents are not deaf, and so end up providing him with resources that assimilate him into the hearing world. With such integration, Kisor’s book really becomes about how hearing parents can raise a deaf child who is, by society’s definition, successful in the hearing world. To begin, Kisor’s parents had the option of placing him in a school for the deaf. The start of deaf education began in the 1500s, which was a huge leap as it was historically believed that deaf people could not be educated. Later, in 1760, the first school for the deaf was created by Charles de L’Eppe. Instead of teaching the deaf to speak, as was previously …show more content…
Being deaf with a lowercase d, is the physical condition of not being able to hear. Just because someone is deaf with a lowercase d, though, does not mean they want to be a part of the community, or that the community will accept them. Sometimes hearing people, such as parents and educators, are considered to be a part of the community. To be fully integrated, one has to know and understand Deaf culture, which has its own set of shared behaviors, language, values, and traditions, that can be very different from the hearing world. Some people consider such separation to be isolating and ineffective. Others see it as the organization of people who know what is it like to be looked down upon by hearing people, who assume themselves