Colin Portnuff

Webcast Description
Colin Portnuff was a bright and passionate humanitarian who lost his speech, but never his love of life nor his sense of humor, to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Colin passed away on February 11, 2007.

We are fortunate to have this webcast of Colin sharing his life experiences and his vision for new applications of assistive technology. He describes receiving his diagnosis, stepping into the “world” of disability, and dealing with public attitudes and discrimination. He shares some of his techniques for managing conversations, and presents some interesting and provocative information for us about the application of speech and voice technology in augmentative and alternative communication.

Colin challenges us to look past disability, voice and language to see people—their emotions, their values and their character—and to appreciate the impact that our work can have on people’s lives.

Colin Portnuff was the 2006 recipient of the ACES Free Speech Now award from Temple University.

Cite as
Portnuff, C. (2006, October 18). Augmentative and Alternative Communication: A User’s Perspective [Video recording].https://tinyurl.com/AAC-Portnuff-2006

Transcript as pdf

Additional Resources

Augmentative Communication News: Living with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (July 2005)This issue focuses on people with ALS and their closest communication partners, and highlights the tremendous difference that effective communication supports has on their lives (pdf).

Gibbons, C., & Fried-Oken, M. (October, 2009). AAC Clinical pathways for neurodegenerative diseases. Presentation at Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, OR. (Handout)

This webcast was produced as part of the work of the AAC-RERC under grant #H133E080011 from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR)in the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS)