An ex-Love Island contestant has been raising the profile of deaf people, and the accent people who are deaf, or who have a profound hearing loss, can have when they speak.
Tasha Ghouri was Love Island’s first deaf contestant, and she recently posted on her TikTok channel sounding different. Tasha usually wears her cochlear implant to help her hear, but one morning chose to film her daily beauty vlog without her implant. Speaking to her followers in her ‘deaf accent’ Tasha said, “I don’t know how loud I’m speaking, or how clear I’m speaking. I normally never put my cochlear implant in in the morning.” She added that similar videos recorded with her implant weren’t showing the real her.
Having posted the clip, the reaction has been extremely positive. The clip has had almost 3 million views and been widely shared. The way people who are deaf, or who have a profound hearing loss, learn to talk can affect how they produce language. Being able to hear themselves speak also has an impact. Michael Quinlan, advocacy manager at the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) said, “It’s great to see Tasha opening up and educating her followers.
Raising awareness of the different ways deaf people communicate is really important and will help change attitudes in a positive way.”
