Autobiography of a Stutterer by Joseph S. Cooper Book Preview

7/31/2019 Autobiography of a Stutterer by Joseph S. Cooper Book Preview

1/26

JOSEPH S. COOPER

BlazeVOX [book

Buffalo, New Yo


2/26

Autobiography of a Stutterer by Joseph S. Cooper

Copyright 2007

Published by BlazeVOX [books]

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced withoutthe publishers written permission, except for brief quotations in reviews.

Printed in the United States of America

Book design by Geoffrey Gatza

First Edition

ISBN: 1-934289-29-9 ISBN 13: 978-1-934289-29-7Library of Congress Control Number: 2006938682

BlazeVOX [books]14 Tremaine AveKenmore, NY 14217

[email protected]

publisher of weird little books

BlazeVOX [ books ]

blazevox.org

2 4 6 8 0 9 7 5 3 1


3/26


4/26


5/26

Autobiography of a Stutterer is a culmination of the past fifteen

years of my life as a stutterer. The purpose of this text is to give readers the

opportunity to experience a speech impediment firsthand. By following

the legend and mimicking the symptoms of a fluency disorder, difficulties

in communication and comprehension will begin to surface. Although

non-stutterers reading this text will naturally elude the psychological fears

and inhibitions experienced by stutterers, they have the chance to discover

the mechanics of a fluency disorder and its frustrating interruptions. The

text is to be read aloud, preferably in front of others.


6/26

12

STUTTERERS LEGEND1

REPETITION of a sound, syllable, word or phrase is the most common

behavior exhibited by stutterers usually provoked by sound and word fears,

situational fears, anxiety, tension, and shame for the speakers lack of control.

It occurs commonly in both stutterers and non-stutterers; however, certainly

the severity of this repetition is more frequent in individuals with this fluency

disorder.

PROLONGATION is one of the least typical behaviors exhibited by stutterers,

occurring most regularly with the sounds ////, or any other fricative2

consonant or vowel. With stutterers, prolonging a sound may lead to an

increase in pitch and/or volume.

1 This Stutterers Legend was compiled with definitions and information from the site,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuttering2

This manner of articulation is a consonant characterized by frictional passage of the expired breaththrough a narrowing at some point in the vocal tract. (Merriam-Websters Collegiate Dictionary,466)


7/26

1

BLOCKING usually occurs during pronunciation of the first letter or syllable

of a word, when the larynx closes, halting the flow of air. This often produce

extraneous portions of silence referred to as unfilled pausestypically

accompanied by personal idiosyncrasies such as finger tapping or head-

scratching to help liberate the speech block.

[ ] WORD SUBSTITUTION occurs where words difficult for a stutterer to

speak are replaced with less-suitable words that are easier to pronounce.

FILLED PAUSES are interjections in normally fluent speech such as um,

uh, er, among others that serve as placeholders during conversation in

order for a listener to know the speaker has not yet finished speaking.


8/26


9/26

1

LIP

Utterance is the incision of thought-

wounded sound. Engorged with digital

friction. Fluency is haphazard architecture.

Consequently his esophagus was in strands. A

series of encrypted messages colonized the

infrastructure. Conceive mouths origin.

Tongue is microbial. Slick spores. What

happens if tongue is wrap ped around the

circumference of memory? Verses of

surreptitious space slipped fervently into body-

house. Pronoun I is anonymous. Mouthed by

impulsion. His lungs were impaled. [In secret]

unless otherwise indicated is where error

patterns are fused into b ody parts.

Spontaneous recovery is a relatively simple

process of mouth packing and sound

deadening.


10/26

16

Inside his vocal chords is the confession

of hearing. Breach any procedural languages. I

am increasing my oracular territory byoccupying yours. We will probably

want to analyze other disconnection

patterns in a similar approach. In reference to

location pretend to be a different one. Vestiges

of prayer debunked throat music. Speak

through another orifice. Through walls voices

strip down to sound and assess resonance.

Victorious in linguistic artifice tongue

streams a bifurcated voltage. I am consciously

fearful of the telephone. Wet palms matted

lashes into a liminal surface. Conversation with

oneself uses offbeat time signatures until an

agreement is reached.


11/26

1

Forgive my equation. The

silences of space are sobbing to avoid

confrontation. He considered eradicating the

tongue. It had on occasion sprung from the

mouth like a baby b etween the legs of a

woman. Instructions dissolve stretched

salaciously over pre-language. An eleven-year-

old tongue hangs from a meat hook. Under the

microscope at the very moment a smile arrived

three sentences were cut down the center.

Tongue will cunningly assume the disguise

of an angel. It opened its mouth and tied me

down. Suck the language of your mass

discussion. Truth is represented by the

scattered syllables of tongue. On the contrary it

has built its own world for itself.


12/26

18

A telephone c all from a telemarketer

caused his tongue to fall cleanly out. The

architecture of the mouth seems to be

changing. Human kind finds him repulsive.

Smegma of gums lushly amused. I was having

trouble feeling you in the back of my throat.

From the forcible and foul the howl and gnaw.

He pronounced the word um parents in

a formidable shape. Glued by contact cement.

They built a fence around the yard when I was

eleven and told me it was to keep anything in

my imagination from getting out. My tongue

turned gangrene for you. He remains the

filament of disparate parts. The moment

between tonguing and talking is deleted. Recall

your purest interpreter.


13/26

1

The first performance was a c leaving

of lexical morphemes. Stained discourse

pressed into seconds of self-translation.

Resistance is the property of limiting the

passage of a merging fiction. We used to take

turns in grade school reading passages from our

[manuals]. They heard his voice and erased all

translation. Your tongue is a hybrid of bacterial

species. Memory is a loose

floorboard in the basement. Trespass on

necessary muscle. Such tongues are said to b e

flapping instead of howling. One phonological

resonance was a loose tooth harmonica.

Arguments demonstrated this ordinary

horizontal. You wont feel pain youll just

bleed.


14/26

20

I have a d ream where tongue is

strapped down inside my mouth and raped into

liquid. Few people possess the desire to talk

unfamiliarly. Breast flesh closed into

subsequent invisibility. Reside in respiration as

a kind of thief. Teeth clenched together engine

the head. Therefore your former answer was

idle. Seamed in semi-darkness. T ongue

suffered multiple casualties. Whether such

unforced discourse really makes a difference

has yet to be determined. A machine-stutterer

is pronounced incommunicable. The

gaping mouth can be construed as sentimental.

You are the most beautiful pitch. No

sp eaking of this broken thing to others.


15/26

2

Is there any strictly material damage? A

melodious extended warbling son. This

might be a slip in the structural design. I want

absolutely. Utter an original [flaw]. Mother

was more familiar through gestures. I bite my

tongue every time I eat. His tongue was

ambushed by silence. The first time I tongued a

girl my jaw was stiff for three days and my

tongue ached. Simulated discourse

conceptualizes human thought. Instead of

fingers on the b athroom door mouths against

linen provide optimum fit allowance. In speech

therapy we were awarded prizes like animals in

training. We grow intimate with monsters.

Stick your tongue in every hole and

ind ent

ation.


16/26

22

A tongue is tightened or released by

torquing the head. Simple languages are

trained to the arbitrary real. He imaginedp ressing his tongue against the grill like

uh a sausage. What he hears is the

peripheral velocity of popular memory. He was

completely naked in the voice box. His

esophagus mated with a preformed

eternal thread. It was cut unspoiled like the

breath of a violet. From where the public is

sitting it is possible to b elieve that debates do

not take place. Full in language then

disapp earing all accountable were

questioned tracked with lip-gloss and put into

an iron cage susp ended in the air in the center

square by a single-syllable. You are very easywith words.


17/26

2

I am unavailable to deliberate

possibility. Tongue is cut where I went. It is

necessary to be among patterns. Ab ducted

and forced to shed its human mask. Assuming

inadaptable surgical pathways um

accusation is the footprint of the

deliberately numb. Tongue will completely

untie with a single p ull. I used to slice worms

in half with Popsicle sticks and watch them

wriggle in mistranslation. Replace

everything in the room with a guarded prop.

His gritted teeth hurled little sounds toward

the unexposed. My voice on the record skips.

A noun is constructed from bile. Just

remember to finish vigilantly. My machine

happens under its own volition.


18/26

24

I tried spelling my name in worm guts

before the Popsicle stick broke in half.

Sp eech was a series of obvious lies. There is

no tongue overturned in your sonata.

Censorship is an ulterior motive of therapeutic

language. A splice decreases tongue

strength by fifteen percent. Be someone

peculiar for your living geometry. I never

prayed for fluency only for the loss of tongue.

Everything entering and leaving the mouth is

processed. Secure loose end with

wrapping of tape. Take a deep breath. Breathe.

Try to relax. Try to. Relax. Let. Let me. Let

me fin. Let. Let me. Let

mefinish. Let finish. Let me. Take a.

Take a deep breathtake a deep breath.


19/26

2

Breathe. Let me. Finish to relax try.

Try to deep me. Try to finish me

deep. Breath a take relax. To me-ish. To take

me. Breathe to try. Let me let. Let breathe

deep me. Take a deep breath. B reathe. The

ear and tongue conspire against utterance in a

measure of cruelty. You are one of these

[pieces]. Words overlook the trim flesh of the

public. If children keep a record of discourse in

its purist form we can degenerate it into a

meaningless routine. Simulated discourse is

not complicated but there are techniques that

improve its success. My tongue made a large

scar in the cent er of your thoughts. You are

saliva electric.


20/26


21/26

2

HARD PALATE

When saliva transforms to rectal

perspiration inflexible rust is exposed in mouth

rubble. The physical act of speech the pleasure

in its form the app reciation of its

compactness is valuable even if the fluent

content of these feelings seems low. Stutter

something sweet. B reathe. Rip strips

along the side and cut into angles. His mouth

was devoured by voices. A piece of human

vocal apparatus is left fluttering between

two diseased tongues. Through c ollege I

rarely asked out a girl if her name began with ahard consonant sound or a vowel. Because

we all co-articulate according to the same rules

discourse becomes a contrived situation with an

enormous number of degrees of freedom.


22/26

28

Affirm the subject by waiting patiently

for a conclusion. This provides good

ab rasion and fatigue resistance. I

mispronounced Indiana as Ind ia. The

adjustments sometimes result in compromise.

He has not abandoned vowel-like productions.

Turned comp letely inside out adults believe

they hear stresses and meaningful intonation

patterns. I never stutter when I sing. Animate

and affirm your material breathing

whether for composition or translation.

Visitors transcribed us. Intention is not

exclusive to meaning. You have c onfessed to

me the narrators metallic body. The

interconnected threads are the catalyst to this

linguistic framework.


23/26

2

The mouth soiled by neglect is

compelled to speak truth under pain of d eath.

Deemed a cry for help all inhabitants of an

open call system have been sealed with wax. A

scene is p erformed under the memory of an

inquisitive machine. Putty tongue is

unwelcomingly pinkish. The broad diaphanous

hole is being tested for noise-making

equipment. He has in his possession a deeper

breath. Repeat [research] with three marbles,

four marbles, etc. The length of a passage does

not determine how many other passages of

the same length exist. He was a pedestrian in

the gray matter of voiceless text ure. Many

people develop some kind of system for dealing

with this difficulty. They became intimate with

each other after swapping p atches of tongue.


24/26

30

The whole picture at a glance detects

any omission. This is a method of control over

an undefeatable opponent. C orked

orifice. Tongue gagged when it was the

center of attention. Please bring b ack the

microphone. Our digital interface is mutating.

Knowing tongue bites at appearance was a

conductor of discourse. The sentimental

anguish of t ongue assuaged the upper crust of

words. I timed my bathroom breaks for

when it was my turn to read. A meaning-

making utterance in the telephone is heard

as heavy breathing. My mouth [went to wrack

and ruin] when speaking to her. Saying hello is

like trying to scream for help in a dream with

your lips folded backward over the sc alpsealed together with cartilage.


25/26

3

B reathing with me to imitate the

words incongruity bests a companion of

mimicry. Breathe the growled air when

consonants back away t oward the throat. A

dead mouth will articulate a flawless sound

effect. Unctuously I pleaded for a different

disability. Take away my hearing. Ill speak in

sign. When language is a carcass sinking in the

mud it does not matter how hard you

pull. B ring tongue onto the cold concrete

floor nights in the basement. B ring tongue to

globs of spittle trembling in the corners of

chapped lips. B ring tongue a negative

advance to the restrictions of habit. I have

kept a journal of suicide letters for my stutter.


26/26

32

Tie a string to tongue and doorknob

and close firmly. His impediment

immediately preceded the conjunction.

Tongue echoed a liturgy of domesticated swine.

The mouth held by an executioner was p ulled

generously by the tongue until torn austerely

from the platform of loose jowls.

C onsciousness here operates as if it were a

machine being turned on and off. I speak so

quickly that the auditorium um falls to

puzzle. I was in a classroom doing a

presentation when tongue became acrobatic.

Corralled in speech therapy class you

and I were intimately lassoed together in a

mock dialogue. Misconstrued shy speech

becomes a spluttering mosaic.

Date post:	04-Apr-2018
Category:	Documents
Upload:	blazevox-books
View:	216 times
Download:	0 times

Autobiography of a Stutterer by Joseph S. Cooper Book Preview

Documents