Meaning: (of a deaf person) understand speech from observing a speaker's lip movements.
Related signs: LIPREAD.
An average skilled lipreader might be able to lipread up to 30-35% with a guesswork for the rest of it. More on lipreading.
"By the way, learning to read lips is grossly offensive. It's like asking an amputee to wiggle their toes." -- Joshua McKenzie (a comment on some blog)
Hearing: "Can you lipread?"
Deaf: "No, can you handread?"
Hearing (nervously chuckling): No.
Deaf kids say the darndest things, too. "My deaf child and I were in a swimming pool and her cat was walking around the edge of the pool meowing at her. I told her he was meowing and she told me 'I know, I can read his lips.'" -- Peggy Mills, USA. Email, February 27, 2000.
