Jenn wrote:

"But Furtwängler's story illustrates a downside. To fill the larger halls
with sufficient sound, the voices, instruments and ensembles had to crank up
to potentially ear-damaging levels. Countless violists, who sit right in
front of the brass, have been deafened as a result.

2. The last sentence is obvious hyperbole. "Deafened"?

Yes, deafened - having their hearing capabilities diminished.
Deafness is not an absolute but a whole spectrum of impairments.

Andy

Andy Cowley wrote:

Jenn wrote:

"But Furtwängler's story illustrates a downside. To fill the larger halls
with sufficient sound, the voices, instruments and ensembles had to crank up
to potentially ear-damaging levels. Countless violists, who sit right in
front of the brass, have been deafened as a result.

2. The last sentence is obvious hyperbole. "Deafened"?

Yes, deafened - having their hearing capabilities diminished.
Deafness is not an absolute but a whole spectrum of impairments.

Yes, you just don't just go deaf, like some turning down the volume control.
Young people think that's how it happens, and there will
always be a volume control to turn up to compensate.

Ah no, ppl get all these noises in their ears, bad enough to send ppl crazy,
or destroy social life.
And perhaps slight noise becomes crashingly loud, so you can't even wash the
dishes
without thinking the clank of the plates is "deafening".

Being blinded means having one's sight removed,
usually blinded means just that, no sight, so we say partially blinded
or sight impaired, we should say the same about hearing....

Patrick Turner.



Andy

On Fri, 16 Dec 2005 10:34:44 GMT, Patrick Turner
wrote:

Being blinded means having one's sight removed,
usually blinded means just that, no sight, so we say partially blinded
or sight impaired, we should say the same about hearing....

MOST people do. They say hearing impared. To most people, if you say
someone is deaf, it means to them that you are talking about someone
who can't hear at all or so little that they must resort to sign
language, not their Uncle Fred, the one with the hearing aid who
sometimes had to lean into the conversation.

Then again, you've got Frenchmen who apply the term to their "enemies"
just to puff themselves up. shrug Probably projecting worries about
their ongoing decrepitude.

I just threw in the last bit to give the little poodle something to
gnaw on.