Stuttering Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==Society, culture, and community== ===In popular culture=== {{See also|Stuttering in popular culture}} {{See also|List of stutterers}} ===Stuttering community=== Many counties have regular events and activities to get people who stutter together in mutual support. These events take place at regional, national, and international level. At a regional level, there are often stuttering support or chapter groups that look to provide a place for people who stutter in the local area to meet, discuss and learn from each other.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Stammering Groups {{!}} STAMMA |url=https://stamma.org/connect/local-groups |access-date=2023-07-23 |website=stamma.org |language=en}}</ref><ref name=":5">{{Cite web |title=Local NSA Chapters {{!}} Stuttering Support Groups |url=https://westutter.org/chapters/ |access-date=2023-07-23 |website=National Stuttering Association |language=en-US}}</ref> At a national level, stuttering charities or groups host conferences. Conferences can vary in their focus and scope, some focus on the latest research developments, some on stuttering and the arts and others still look to provide a space for stutterers simply to come together. There are two different international meetings of stutterers. The [[International Stuttering Association]] World Congress is primarily focused on people who stutter. There is also Joint World Congress on Stuttering and Cluttering that brings together academics, researchers, speech-language pathologists, people who stutter, and people who clutter for a focus more on research, viewpoints, and treatments for stuttering. === Historic advocacy and self-help === Self-help and advocacy organisations for people who stammer have reportedly been in existence since the 1920s. In 1921, a Philadelphia-based attorney who stammered, J. Stanley Smith, established the Kingsley Club. <ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Thurber |first=James |date=1930-04-25 |title=Stammerers' Club |language=en-US |magazine=The New Yorker |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1930/05/03/stammerers-club |access-date=2023-08-01 |issn=0028-792X}}</ref> Designed to support people with a stammer in the Philadelphia area, the club took inspiration for its name from [[Charles Kingsley]]. Kingsley, a nineteenth-century English social reformer and author of ''Westward Ho!'' and ''The Water Babies'', had a stammer himself.<ref>{{Citation |title=Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country, ''1830–1882'' |date=2012-02-01 |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.7135/upo9781843317562.019 |work=Perceptions of the Press in Nineteenth-Century British Periodicals |pages=261–299 |access-date=2023-08-01 |publisher=Anthem Press|doi=10.7135/upo9781843317562.019 |isbn=978-1-84331-756-2 }}</ref> Whilst Kingsley himself did not appear to recommend self-help or advocacy groups for people who stammer, the Kingsley Club promoted a positive mental attitude to support its members in becoming confident speakers, in a similar way discussed by Charles Kingsley in ''Irrationale of Speech''. Other support groups for people who stammer began to emerge in the first half of the twentieth century. In 1935 a Stammerer's Club was established in Melbourne, Australia, by a Mr H. Collin of Thornbury.<ref>{{Cite news |date=1935-05-23 |title=STAMMERERS' CLUB. |work=Sydney Morning Herald |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17146929 |access-date=2023-08-01}}</ref> At the time of its formation it had 68 members. The club was formed in response to the tragic case of a man from Sydney who "sought relief from the effects of stammering in suicide". As well as providing self-help, this club adopted an advocacy role with the intention of appealing to the Government to provide special education and to fund research into the causes of stammering.<ref>{{Cite news |date=1936-10-10 |title=THE STAMMERERS' CLUB OF QUEENSLAND. |work=Cairns Post |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article41779262}}</ref><ref>''Bermuda Reporter''</ref> === Disability rights movement === Some people who stutter, and are part of the [[disability rights movement]], have begun to embrace their stuttering voices as an important part of their identity.<ref>{{Cite web|title = Did I Stutter?|url = http://didistutter.org/|website = Did I Stutter?|access-date = 2015-10-05|url-status = live|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20151006092633/http://www.didistutter.org/|archive-date = 2015-10-06}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title = How To Stutter More|url = http://stuttermore.tumblr.com/|website = stuttermore.tumblr.com|access-date = 2015-10-05|url-status = live|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20151029165325/http://stuttermore.tumblr.com/|archive-date = 2015-10-29}}</ref> In July 2015 the UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) announced the launch of the Defence Stammering Network to support and champion the interests of British military personnel and MOD civil servants who stammer and to raise awareness of the condition.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.gov.uk/government/news/defence-stammering-network-launched |title=Defence Stammering Network launched |access-date=2015-07-25 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150825135116/https://www.gov.uk/government/news/defence-stammering-network-launched |archive-date=2015-08-25 }}</ref> === Stuttering pride === {{Main|Stuttering pride}} [[File:Stuttering Pride Flag.png|thumb|264x264px|The Stuttering Pride flag symbolises the waves of stuttering pride rippling through the community.]] [[Stuttering pride]] (or stuttering advocacy) is a [[social movement]] repositioning stuttering as a valuable and respectable way of speaking. The movement seeks to counter the societal narratives in which temporal and societal expectations dictate how communication takes place.<ref name="worldcat.org">{{Cite book |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1121135480 |title=Stammering pride and prejudice : difference not defect |date=2019 |others=Patrick Campbell, Christopher Constantino, Sam Simpson |isbn=978-1-907826-36-8 |location=[Albury] |oclc=1121135480}}</ref> In this sense, the stuttering pride movement challenges the pervasive societal narrative of stuttering as a defect and instead positions stuttering as a valuable and respectable way of speaking in its own right. The movement encourages stutterers to take pride in their unique speech patterns and in what stuttering can tell us about the world. It also advocates for societal adjustments to allow stutterers equal access to education and employment opportunities, and addresses how this may impact [[stuttering therapy]].<ref name="worldcat.org"/> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page