This speech inspired by the people surrounding me who are hooked to their headphones or cell phone speakers all time to their ears. :)
Here goes my 8th speech. I used presentation slides as my visual aid. Speech material is a collectiom from various sources.
Only the speech text is here but for the visual effect, it is better to watch the video :)
Golden Ears
Good Afternoon Everybody!
This dates back to the initial dates in my career when I used to go by the BMTC bus changing the bus in corporation. It would be the regular bus and the regular people almost everyday.
And one such group of people where some high school students, nicely laded in their uniform, very beautiful smiling faces and heavily conversing with each other. One tends to go back to their school going days when we see such students.
All the bus passengers had become mute on-lookers of their conversation, trying to figure out what are they conversing about. Their conversations were aloud, everybody could hear it.
But strangely, nobody could understand it. Why? Simply because we were normal people with good hearing skills and they were special people with good conversation skills using only their hands and sounds.
Dear friends, they were the students of a deaf and dumb school.
Does this give us a jitter?
Well, this made me think about all the normal people like us who have golden ears. How cherished should we be about our hearing capability.
Well, do we really give importance to our ears? Are we cherishing about it? Are we taking enough care about it?
Friends, today my topic is all about ears.
This is for all normal people like us to know and to be aware of our own ears. Also, see how much we take care of it.
So, do we actually take care? Yeah, obviously, whenever we get pains in our ear we go to ENT specialist, right.
I have two parts today.
First part is a very short introduction about the golden and magical ears and their working.
[Slides]
The ear is made up of three basic structures: the outer ear, the middle ear, and the inner ear.
The purpose of the Outer Ear is to:
1) It delivers sound to the middle ear
2) Within the outer ear canal are wax-producing glands and hairs that protect the middle ear.
The purpose of the Middle Ear is to:
1) Transmit and amplify sounds from the eardrum to the oval window
2) Act as a dampener on loud sounds that may damage the inner ear (cochlea)
Here, we are seeing the working of the middle ear.
The purpose of the Inner Ear is to:
The inner ear contains the most important parts of the hearing mechanism - two chambers called the vestibular labyrinth and the cochlea.
Vestiblar labyrinth:
1) Maintain a sense of balance by responding to gravity and changes in acceleration of the head (up/down, forward/back, and side to side)
2) Communicating balance to the brain
The Cochlea:
The cochlea is the second part of the inner ear and is the actual organ of hearing. It is embedded in the skull in what is called the mastoid area, a spongy part of the skull just behind where the jaw hinges. The mastoid bone acts as an amplifier for some sounds, especially those in the lower frequency ranges.
Functions:
1) Sound wave interpreter and converter
2) Messaging to the Brain: In the brain the electrical impulses are translated into sounds which we recognize and understand.
Opposite the base of each "root" of a hair cell are the nerve endings of nerve bundles that carry the hair-cell generated impulses to the brain. This bundle of nerves is called the "8th nerve".
This means that in a healthy young person there are about 30,000 - 35,000 associated nerve fiber endings across each synapse. The 8th nerve carries the electrical/ chemical messages to the brain for processing and is the conduit for the messages from the brain back to the cochlea.
Well, Friends, are you seeing stars? Got a jitter now… Ecstatic and amazed how our ears toils for us… or bored of some stuff?
Now, moving on to the second part,
Now, that we know what ears do for us to hear properly, let’s see, what do we do with our ears?
[Headphones and latest gadgets figures]
We use so many gadgets, headphone, bluetooth headphones, mobile hands-free, any new gadgets that are in.
Has it happened to you that you didn’t realize a person who has come to your cube, had actually had to tap on your desk for you to notice.
Has it happened to you that while crossing the road, you forgot about the honking of the car?
Have you witnessed in a bus, conductor screamed for no reason at all.
Does the car behind you, has to honk and inform you that the signal is Green.
If this sounds familiar, then you are in the listening to the right speech.
Now, let’s see, what are the different noise levels that we normally hear?
Most people are unaware how dangerous is to exposure of noise levels on a daily basis, but usually for far less time that it would take for hearing damage to occur.
The harmful effects can be cumulative, so long-term exposure to short periods of loud noise can produce hearing loss years later.
Hearing damage from headphones is probably more common, because many people exploit the acoustic isolation by listening at higher volumes.
Moreover, even at comparable volumes, due to the close coupling of the transducers to the ears, they are under high-risk.
After exposure to loud music, the listener may experience "threshold shifting," when low-level sounds are no longer as audible as they were.
What happens in long term?
Two types of hearing damage:
• Sensineural hearing loss:
– When high energy sound waves, rippling through ear fluid, over stimulate and kill hair cells
– Result: When hair cells for a band of frequencies are destroyed, those frequencies are no longer heard
• Tinnitus hearing loss:
– The damaged cells fire continuously even though there is no real sound
– Described as a persistent, loud buzz in the head at the frequency of the hearing damage.
– For some tinnitus sufferers, the buzz is very loud - 90dB or more and can compromise the quality of life, not to mention completely ruin all ability to enjoy music.
How to Safegurad?Should we stop using Headphones and its variant?
If you can do this, that’s the best.
But what else can we do:
1. Setting Safe Headphone Volume Levels
a. Always adjust the volume level such that you are able to hear the outside noise as well. Not only ears, it will prevent you from accident’s as well.
b. For those who wear headphones (eg walkmans), the volume is also too loud if a person standing near a listener can hear the music coming through the headphones.
c. Stereos and other types of amplification devices should be kept to a moderate level. People should be able to talk and be heard over the music. If people need to shout to be heard above the music, then the volume is too loud.
2. Wearing Ear protectors and ear plugs, if we have to listen long time
3. Anyone who listens to loud music or is exposed to loud noise on a regular basis should test hearing periodically, because hearing loss can be cumulative, very gradual and virtually symptomless.
4. Wearing headphones during exercise is also dangerous to hearing. Aerobic exercise diverts blood from the ears to the limbs, and leaves the inner ear more vulnerable to damage from loud sound. So, better avoid.
So, friends, with this, I want to conclude my speech saying that, let’s all be normal people, let’s not try to become special people. Let’s cherish this golden gift given by God by being aware and giving importance to it.Let’s protect ourselves, because nobody else can.
Only you should be caring about yourself. Take care.
Thank You.
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