Proud Stutter

Amanda Mammana’s America’s Got Talent audition put a national spotlight on stuttering. At first, I couldn’t understand why it made me feel so uncomfortable watching it. Shouldn’t I be happy for a fellow woman who stutters getting this opportunity? And then I read Courtney Margulis’ post. She put words into what I had been feeling while watching the video of the audition.

In Season 2’s first bonus episode, I speak with Courtney and T...

In our debut episode of Season 2, Maya speaks with the show's first Australian who stutters, Cameron Raynes, a lecturer at the University of South Australia. The co-host for this week is Dana Amihere, executive director of Afro LA, a community focused news outlet centering the black experience in and around greater LA. Also listen if you want to hear Maya try a British accent.

Topics Covered

Intersectional identities overlap, connect, disconnect and can even attempt to cancel each other out. During a live interview at the National Stuttering Association's 39th Annual Conference in Newport Beach California, I talked with multiple people who stutter about their intersectional identities and how these different identities show up in their lives. 

Interviewees include Christian, an Asian American man who stutters and a ...

Maya’s dad is one of her biggest fans. He’s listened to every episode and now it’s time for his podcast debut. In this bonus episode, Maya talks to her dad, also known as “Aba,” about his experience moving to a country where he didn’t speak the language, what he’s learned from listening to Proud Stutter, and more!

Mentions: 

It’s always National Stuttering Awareness Week with Proud Stutter. Maya highlights the festivities from NSAW for this bonus episode, including an edited version of the Creating Safe Spaces For People Who Stutter panel, featuring Mariam Elba, Mike Meaney, and Dr. Rick Herder. 

Be sure to listen to the entire episode to find out about Season 2 - launch date and theme! 

You can find everything we discuss on today's show on Proud Stu...

Is there an activity where you feel 'at one' or ‘in the zone’? There's a term in psychology for this state of being called 'flow'. 

For this bonus episode, Maya talks to Jayne Devlin, a Community Dance Artist and Co-Artistic Director of Inner Ground Dance Company.

Her research interests include exploring how participation in arts, creativity and culture may promote an enhanced sense of wellbeing and connection for...

This year, National Stuttering Awareness Week is May 9 - May 15. Let’s talk about its history, why it matters, and how you can help spread the word.

IN THIS EPISODE

LINKS:

Proud Stutter launches its new membership program today. All funds of the program will go back into the podcast. We won't be able to do the show without your support! Sign up here: ko-fi.com/proudstutter/tiers.

Popular culture and the media has a huge power to shift the hearts and minds of our society. Unfortunately, TV, film, and the media have not done the best job in representing people who stutter and have largely left out t...

Eli Taulman is a teenager who has had a stutter since he first started talking. While he is proud of his stutter today, he didn’t always feel that way. He hid from the world by self-isolating and was deeply ashamed of his stutter growing up. A key turning point was attending his first National Stuttering Association conference where he met other stutterers for the first time.

Maya and Cynthia chat with Eli, Proud Stutter’s youngest...

There is no definitive answer to why a person stutters. However, thanks to Frank Guenther and his research lab at Boston University, the mystery of stuttering has become a little clearer. With advances in brain activity monitoring technology, neuroscientists like Frank are able to explore stuttering in exciting new ways. 

Frank joins Maya and Cynthia for a conversation about his research on the underlying causes of stuttering and ho...

People who stutter are starting to create support groups at their workplaces as a way to create a safe space to discuss stuttering and sharing tips and strategies. Mike Meaney is one of these people. He recently started a stuttering support group at one of the biggest technology companies in the world.

Maya and Cynthia talk with Mike about how he started a support group at Meta (formerly known as Facebook), and how it has transforme...

The movement to expand diversity and inclusivity in newsrooms is growing. Yet stuttering, a speech disability affecting nearly 1% of the population, is seldom talked about in the newsroom.

This week, Mariam Elba speaks with Maya and Cynthia about what it’s like to have a stutter in the newsroom. Mariam, a woman who stutters, is a research reporter at Pro Publica and an adjunct professor at CUNY’s Craig Newmark Journalism School. Mar...

Blackness, stuttering, music, and religion are all complex topics in their own right. Yet, Jerome Ellis combines them beautifully in his work, like when he uses academic and theoretical language to parse out the relationship between blackness and music.

In the second part of our interview with Ellis, we talk more about his album, The Clearing, and how he draws out the beauty of stuttering through various mediums – history to show th...

JJJJJerome Ellis talks with Maya and Cynthia about the intersections of being a black person who stutters and a musician, how his views of his disability evolved since childhood, and why it was so important for him to connect his stutter to his ancestral history of slavery in his work. He also highlights how the stage is a safe space for stuttering and music is a source of healing the pain he experienced as a child.

“Growing up I fe...

Not everyone who stutters shows it all the time. There are people who become very good at hiding it by substituting words, avoiding high-octane situations, and choosing to remain quiet to avoid stuttering. People like this are often identified as having a "covert" stutter.

Both Maya and guest Sarah Nelson identify as covert stutters. In this episode, they talk about passing as fluent, disclosing to their families and friends...

Did you know there is a community of Speech-Language Pathologists who stutter? Bailey Levis, a speech therapist and proud person who stutters, is the founder of the San Francisco Speech and Fluency Center. Bailey’s approach to stuttering treatment is unique in that he centers his practice around acceptance, confidence-building, and goal setting.

Maya and Cynthia speak with Bailey about his stuttering treatment philosophy and what le...

Maya and Cynthia talk to James Hayden, a person who stutters, a Tedx speaker, and the author of “Dear World, I Stutter.”

Many stutterers like James and Maya have been discriminated against because of their stutter, whether it be in a job, during an interview, or at school.

So often, we pass judgments on people by our first impressions of them, often without giving it a second thought. But how often do we take the time to look beyond ...

Maya and her mom have a raw and emotional conversation about her stutter. 

Before this interview, Maya had never shared with her mom how she really felt about growing up with a stutter, how exhausting speech therapy was after school, and how hiding her stutter took so much out of her mentally.

“Having all these tools to practice was just another kind of thing I had t-to think about when I never really wanted to do it in the first p-p...