The HLAA-TC Book Club met on Tuesday, February 27th to discuss the nonfiction book “The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales” by Oliver Sacks. This book didn’t deal directly with hearing loss, however it is a well known book (published in 1985 and reprinted many times over the years) and its author was a well known neurologist and author. Our discussion of the book yielded many interesting insights and listed below are some:
Further Information on Oliver Sacks:
- The Wikipedia entry on Oliver Sacks (includes a list of books published): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_Sacks
- Oliver Sacks had a condition called Prosopagnosia (or Face Blindness) where he couldn’t recognize faces (including his own), read this article about it and the book he wrote about it: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/prosopagnosia-oliver-sacks-battle-with-face-blindness/
- The Oliver Sacks Foundation Website: https://www.oliversacks.com/
- Documentary about Oliver Sacks “Oliver Sacks: His Own Life”: https://www.oliversacksdoc.com/watch-now
- “Radiant Minds” an Audible podcast on Oliver Sacks and his work: http://tinyurl.com/3uv56es8
- An article by his partner about their relationship: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/mar/26/bill-hayes-insomniac-city-my-life-with-oliver-sacks-new-york
- About the movie based on one of his books, “Awakenings”: https://www.oliversacks.com/watch-listen/stream-awakenings-featuring-robin-williams-and-robert-de-niro-on-netflix/
- TedTalks “What Hallucination Reveals About Our Minds” by Oliver Sacks: https://www.oliversacks.com/watch-listen/tedtalks-what-hallucination-reveals-about-our-minds/
Things talked about during book club (not book related):
- One of our new attendees shared that she coaches on hearing loss: https://beingheard.net/
- We talked about how to tell people you have hearing loss (without apologizing),
- We actually have communication tips on our own flyer: HLAATC Information Flyer
- this article also covers communication tips,
- this Blog by Starkey covers how to tell different groups of people that you have hearing loss
- We also talked about various apps for transcription, etc. and we have previous posts that talk about apps for hearing loss:
- We also talked about how to advocate for yourself and the accommodations that you need
- Great advice and tips on Advocacy for Accommodations from the National Association of the Deaf
- This video on Communication Access and Self Advocacy is by the Minnesota Department of Human Services Deaf and Hard of Hearing Division.
Thank you to all who attended for your open and engaging conversation (see, we’re not JUST a book club)!
Next Book and Book Club:
March 2024: ”The Silent House” By Nell Pattison (fiction) BARD/NLS: DB 111629. Tuesday, March 26th, 7:00pm – 8:30pm (CST) [ZOOM REGISTER HERE]
Note: The author won’t be joining us but has agreed to answer questions about the book. Two weeks before March book club send your questions for Nell Pattison to Laura social@hlaatc.singlerdesign.com