Parker Posey, a beagle mix, has mastered 130 vocabulary terms and various combinations, including “thank you,” “hmm?” and “play music.” In her lingo, “squeaker” plus “car” means “ambulance.”
Writer: Jinessa Lewis
Photographer: Duane Tinkey
Imagine: A family is sitting in the living room catching up on life. Music plays in the background. The songs keep switching every few seconds, as if someone is searching for a favorite track.
That someone is the family dog, Parker Posey. With her front paws, the canine DJ presses buttons on the floor that activate a voice for Alexa: “Play doggy music.”
In all, Parker uses more than 100 buttons to communicate with her humans, including Sascha Crasnow. In January 2021, after losing her previous dog of 17 years, Crasnow wasn’t sure she was ready for another. But the combination of pandemic isolation, the long winters in Michigan — where she was living at the time — and the TikTok videos her stepfather kept sending of a “talking” dog named Bunny, reignited her interest. Watching the clips of dogs using buttons to speak, she figured she could try to train a new pup of her own.
Crasnow, who teaches art at Drake University, discovered the work of Christina Hunger, a speech pathologist who researches canine communication, and read one of her books cover to cover during a flight. That’s when Parker entered her life, and Crasnow immediately ordered a set of speech buttons.
Six months later, puppy Parker was already working with six buttons, even though experts suggest starting with just two or four. Within hours, Parker had pressed the “all done” button on her own — her first words. A precocious pup, Parker’s lexicon grew to 25 buttons in just two weeks of training. Now, just over four years on, she has mastered 130 buttons and is part of a pet cognition and communication study at the University of California San Diego.
Crasnow orders Parker’s plastic speech buttons in dog-visible colors from an online site called FluentPet. With each new set, she records her own voice saying key words — “hot,” “snow,” “thank you,” “hmm?” — and arranges them in a hexagonal layout on the floor. These buttons are a form of augmented and alternative communication (AAC) technology, a common tool in speech therapy for nonverbal humans.
As Parker’s communication board grew, so did her vocabulary and her ability to express herself. Some words clicked instantly while others took more time as Parker worked out their meaning in her day-to-day life. Sometimes she even hinted at new words she needed, like the summer she stayed with a friend’s dog who had a “play music” button. Crasnow added a new “music” button at home, but Parker didn’t touch it until one weekend when Crasnow’s nephew insisted on blasting songs from “Paw Patrol.” When the music stopped, Parker marched over and pressed the button repeatedly until something she liked came on. The next day, she used it again.
Moments like these have shown Crasnow just how intentional Parker is. Over time, Parker has formed combinations to share insights no one expected. Once, she spotted an ambulance outside their house and described it as a “squeaker car,” combining two different buttons. Another day, while Crasnow was hand-washing sweaters and ignoring the timer that had gone off, Parker approached the board and pressed “water” followed by “sweater.”
Living with a talking dog has permanently changed how Crasnow relates to animals. Now, she said, she sees more clearly the agency they have and how little they’re usually given.
“They are beings that have desires, have wants, have preferences and have agency,” she said. “We just have to give them the opportunity to be able to exercise that more.”
With the buttons, Parker can express frustration, joy, curiosity and affection, in addition to her taste in music. But the pair has also strengthened their communication even beyond the board. Understanding Parker’s words has sharpened Crasnow’s understanding of her body language, too.
For anyone thinking about starting their own talking-dog journey, Crasnow’s advice is simple: Do it. Start with a few meaningful words, model them consistently, and let your pet guide you.
Puppy Profile
Name: Parker Posey
Age: 5
Breed: Beagle Mix
Personality: Sassy, silly, full of joy, and prone to zoomies
Interests: Fetch, mischief, her cozy “pita pocket” snoozer bed and the last bite of every Popsicle. She dresses as a Parker Posey character every Halloween. She’s known to steal things just to get chased, and she’s mastered the art of the dramatic button press when she wants attention.
