What is Free and Fair Use
Below are various resources developed or curated by TISA over the years; Feel free to copy and share freely. You may (we will be very happy) translate them in regional languages and different formats too- like, you could read out “Apna Hath Jagannath”, the self-help manual, and share it as a series of podcast. Feel free to share the link with us.
The Self Help Manual (Hindi & Eng)
Twelve Questions: A primer
.
Published in 2007 with valuable help from Samagra Trust, Dehradun, this booklet offered answers for common questions about stammering. It was used an entry point activity: a hard copy was donated to school library as an introduction to TISA, before working with children in the school. A good primer. (Hindi, English)
Hindi Book on Acceptance
A mini book in Hindi to explore various shades and nuances of acceptance- and how it sets you free psychologically, to move ahead and grow. In TISA workshops, we explore various dimensions of acceptance: at psychological level, it might mean being no more “touchy” about stammering; at cognitive level it may mean going beyond obsessive need to monitor one’s own fluency and listener’s reactions all the time. At emotional level- it may mean- giving up all sadness and “victimhood” and participating in the joy of life; stop postponing things. At physiological plain, it may mean- that we no more tense up, hold our breath and struggle in that moment of difficulty: we stammer effortlessly. Acceptance simply means: accepting what IS. Being at PEACE with this moment and move ahead calmly. The writer, Amit Kushwaha, is a prolific Hindi writer. (Hindi) (English)
A Hindi Essay on stammering
A brief essay which explores what is stammering and what can be done about it – written for general audience. Three pages as JPG images, can be printed and shared. (link)
Stories
The Child: A mythological fantasy (Part 1, Part 2)
Can children differentiate between fact and fantasy? Are the capable of lying, as we adults are? A little lie
A recollection of a pet dog, named after a BBC presenter – Tim Sebastian
Three micro-stories on lock down in Hindi – तीन लघु कथाएँ
Podcasts
We tinkered with this medium too! Here are some early efforts by some of us..
https://youtu.be/cjwuC–drg4 (Jasbir Sandhu gives a talk on Radio)
https://soundcloud.com/onetakerecording/podcast-hr
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksGGfGbunkw (FM radio)
ISAD Contributions
Many of us have been contributing to Online Conference to commemorate International Stammering Awareness Day (22nd Oct.). It was initially started and organised by Judith Kuster, and later by ISA. Here are some links. Of course other papers are also worth reading. Viren Gandhi has been creating a single file of all the conference papers ever since 2002 (like this).
Prakhar Sachan (2006 ISAD paper).
Prem Kumar (2007, ISAD, Intro video)
Translation by Sachin (2007 ISAD, Link)
Self Vs self by Sachin (2008 ISAD, link)
Manimaran and JP ( 2010, ISAD paper on Self Help groups)
Sachin’s paper (2010, ISAD, What we actually need)
Vivek Singh, Pune, (2011, ISAD, My journey)
Harish Usgaonker (2011, ISAD, The Magic Interview)
Dhruv Gupta (2013, ISAD, Turn Around Thinking)
Sachin (2014 ISAD, The Indian Story)
Vipul Patil (2016, ISAD, Mind war)
Pune/Mumbai SHG (2016, ISAD, People who buffer)
Abhinav Bakshi (2016, ISAD, School Chale ham)
Media Coverage
Pune stammerers find their voice in theatre
Self help group for those who stammer
Stammering is Okay with Dr. Satyendra Srivastava
Goa NC in Gomantak Times (Page 1, bottom)
Goa NC in Heraldo
Internal Reports
Even though we did not have to report to any monitoring agency (!), TISA has produced many reports for future reference and our own learning.
Alternative-routes to Recovery
First mumbai meet (April 2008)
kolkata Communication workshop
First communication workshop at Herbertpur
NC2014_TISA_v02(by vikas ranga)
Beyond Stammering?
What lies beyond stammering? Who am I when I am neither fluent, nor stammering? What role am I playing when I am just quiet? When I am in deep sleep? These are some of the questions we ask, when we have gone beyond the misleading binary of fluency Vs Disfluency, set up by the society and our own expectations. Some of us did so, and were greatly helped in our inquiry by many great teachers, from east as well as west. Many of us have tried Vipassana, Brahma Vidya and other paths based on meditative traditions. We actively encourage pws to explore these paths because one of the phenomena seen in stammering is “Loss of self” or alienation: we do not belong anywhere because we stammer (that is what we believe). And this leads to a lot of inner suffering. This can lead to a deeper search but often is stifled by such notions: Just fix your stammering and everything will be ok!
It is quite legitimate and useful to ask: who am I beyond my stammering? It will be quite unfortunate if we went away happily after getting some relief thru Stuttering modification, fluency shaping, DAF/FAF gadget stuck in our ears, CBT, “life altering workshops” teaching us to be our authentic (but fluent) self – without exploring the nature of Self itself. Who are we? Who is it who wants to be fluent at any cost? and then what?
To be an Indian pws and not wonder about these questions, is like being an American who never saw Disneyland!
Here we share some resources:
Izabella - Children's story
A beautiful story from Beata Akerman of Romania (her ISAD paper), for siblings and the family of a child who stammers. You may take turns at reading it at bedtime. Great story for practicing a role play with friends or siblings and to have fun. Captures well the feelings and expectations of children who stammer.
Hindi picture book; Hindi text without pictures,
English Picture book, English text without pictures
Hindi Animation Video, Podcast
Samwad Magazine
Samwad means communication in Hindi. This bilingual magazine was brought out with great joy and care by Harish and Amit, between 2011 and 2015. It showcased events and sentiments from various SHGs, with write ups from our overseas friends too. Here are all the issues as pdf files:
Volume 1 – Aug, 2010
Volume 2 – Nov, 2010
Volume 3 – Jan, 2011
Volume 4 – May, 2011
Volume 5 – Aug, 2011
Volume 6 – Oct, 2011
Volume 7 – Dec, 2011
Volume 8 – Apr, 2012
Volume 9 – Aug, 2012
Volume 10 – Nov, 2012
Volume 11 – Jan, 2013
Volume 12 – May, 2013
Volume 13 – Oct, 2013
Videos
We have made many videos, to put our stammering out into the public: so that it becomes a common place issue which we can easily talk about. TISA has a official youtube channel.
Hindi Beginner Videos
Series of Hindi videos explaining various concepts and tools in a simple way; Good resource for beginners.
Haklao, Magar pyar se (2 videos; total about 78 minutes)
Face the Fear Videos
Series of videos explaining various concepts and tools in a simple way; Good resource for beginners.
Goa NC: Women go on stage and do a role play
Communication Workshops
Three day Communication workshops give participants a close view of what acceptance and self help mean in practice. These have been very popular and one very tangible contribution of TISA to society.
Role plays on the last day of the workshop
Skit in Bhopal
First Workshop Testimony
Resources for Special Groups
Parents & Teachers
Parents and Teachers can play a significant role. Lot of this role is – accepting the child as s/he is and demonstrating it through behaviour all the time. Speak slowly yourself, the way you want child to. Ask less questions and wait for her to finish.
Employers
Women
Therapist
External Resources
Stuttering Homepage
Dr Judith Kuster is a professor of Communication Sciences at Minnesota. She has done an invaluable service by maintaining this home page (“Mother of all resources”). She has actively encouraged many pws all around the world to open up, write and share- on their way to recovery. The first IPWS to be inspired by her is Prakhar Sachan (link to his 2006 ISAD paper).
Harrison has truly redefined our understanding of stammering (check his “hexagon”).. (learn more about him)
Biographies
My Silent Pause ( Hunter Adair ) An interesting biography of a scotsman, who worked through his own difficulties and perfected his own technique – a pause and then start again when the audience looks at you.. Perhaps the first documentation of successful self help attempt.
My Experiments In Conquering Stuttering and Stammering Can a stammerer fly a plane? Biography of a pws who became a fighter pilot.
What about your biography? Write and share here.
Stammering in Movies
Zuban – a great Hindi film: here is a clip,
Unspeakable is a good documentary. The maker, John Paskievich made it as a part of his recovery project. Here is a clip.
King’s Speech is a masterpiece. Watch the full movie here for free.
Front of The Class is about Tourrette Syndrome which shares many features (and a gene, I guess) with stammering. Inspirational! Full movie at Youtube!
Rocket Science has lot of dark humor but comes pretty close to portraying what we go through in our growing up years: Intense American Drama! But also full of deep insights as to how relationships evolve, how our self-concept pushes thru many disappointments and set backs (clip).
Media Resources
Please feel free to adapt these resources for your need and context.
Power Point Slides
TISA Powerpoint (Eng) about TISA from Jaipur SHG (Soumya)
How Family and Teachers can help (Hindi)