Kid's philosophical talk on 'deaf reading'

On an ordinary Sunday morning after-breakfast shopping in Amcorp Mall, we saw a little stall ran by a group of people with hearing impairment selling 'deaf art' and calenda for 2011.

Decided to make a little contribution, I browsed the stall with my 6 and 7-year-old boys.  Being the first time close-encounter with people with hearing impairment, the kids were very curious of the way the deafs communicate using sign-language.

Now, the most interesting and amazing part was...

Boy: papa, can they read?
Papa: yes, they can read because they can see.
Boy: can they read in their mind?
Papa: yes, of course they can read in mind because they can see.
Boy: but they cannot hear (un-convinced).
Papa: yes, but they can see.
Boy: (started to become impatient) but they can't hear, how do they learn to read?
Papa/mama: they can't hear... but they can see, right? So, they can read lor...
Boy: (frustrated for not being understood) but if they couldn't hear, how do they read in their mind?
Papa + Mama: ......(silence for a few seconds)...

At this juncture, I was very confused why the boys were so un-convinced with our simple answer despite repeating ourselves for so many times.  Isn't it simple that the deaf can see --> so they can read --> so they can read in their mind.  That's what I thought, initially.

After taking a step-back and a moment of pause, I suddenly realized that the boy had seen the issue of "deaf reading-in-mind" from an angle that has never crossed my mind before!

Kids, for having a very pure and innocent mind, could be unbelieveable in looking at things from many different angles!

To all the adults, do we understand why the boys are frustrated?  That is because he didn't understand how do the deaf 'pronounce' words and sentences 'silently' in their mind.  While we are reading this sentence in our mind (silently), we are actually 'pronouncing' the words in our mind silently.  We can understand the sentences and the meaning by pronouncing words in our mind, in the way that we learnt through hearing.  We certainly pronounce words in our mind the way we are taught through hearing, and in turn, we comprehend what we see by 'making' up the sound of the word 'silently' in our mind.

Now, the boy was curious if the 'deaf' read in their mind the same way that we do!  How do the 'deafs' understand words by 'silently' making out the sound of the words in their mind?

I felt ashame for not able to see thing from different angles.

While working in an 'artificial speech production' project sometime ago, I remembered that human's hearing + speech production is such an interesting invention of the nature.  We learn speech by our hearing, NOT vision.  That's why baby can pick up speech without knowing the position of mama's tongue and lips.  That's why the borned blind can speak just like us.

Now, what about the deaf?  Do they read-in-mind the way we do?  Certainly not.  But then, how?  Do they 'pronounce silently in mind' at all?  That's what the boy was asking.

I was not able to answer his question, that might sound simple, this time.