Deaf Culture Controversy

Galludet University is considered by most one of the most visible movers and shakers of the deaf culture and community in the United States. An article came out by the Washington Post in 2006, and still to this day I keep coming back to it because it really hits home for me. Click here for the Article

The essence of the article looks at the debate of deaf "purists" against those who acknowledge their deafness but are able to integrate into the larger society by use of voice and assistive technology. Basically, their claim against Fernandez was that she was not "deaf enough". I continue to this day to be completely outraged at this mindset.

I had my own personal experiences with this while living in Rochester, NY. I moved there partially because Rochester has the highest number of deaf per capita in the United States. I grew up only knowing 1 other deaf person for the early early years of my life. After moving to Phoenix with my family when I was 10, I was the only deaf person I knew, period.

It is hard to explain what it feels like to be singled out because I was deaf, but then to also try to fit in with others and be held back. I had speech therapy almost every day. Getting pulled out of class and having to miss recess was just the beginning. The classrooms tried to make me wear an FM Loop System, until I flat out refused to put it on. Imagine wearing a black taped coil the thickness of your thumb around your neck, and the teacher having to wear a special microphone. At 10 years old in a new city, this was overwhelming.

I wanted to play sports like other kids, but I had to be careful when I wore helmets playing softball because the sweat was bad for the hearing aid. I wore latex protectors, but they only did so much. Even being able to hear the coaches from the outfield was difficult. I am a balance hazard to myself on a bike or skates, and have had more than one run in with the black asphalt or a concrete wall.

Back to Rochester. I was trying to brush back up on my ASL, and so I went to the Rochester School for the Deaf to meet with a teacher and see if she had room in her class for me. Her response when I tried to communicate with my rusty sign language skills was to huff away when I had to resort to finger spelling, and when I was talking as I was signing, she looked absolutely mortified.

I am grateful to Rochester Institute of Technology's National Technical Institute for the Deaf for helping to fund part of my graduate education. I got a federal grant to cover 2/3rds of my grad tuition, since I qualified for their severely deaf cap. But I was shunned there, too. I had a student in my class who used an interpreter, and they communicated with me as well. They were helpful to have in case I missed part of the lecture, I could look and the signing usually had a 5-6 second delay, helping to fill in the gaps. But when I tried to make friends, they were not willing to compromise at all. Some hearing folks were curious about sign language and liked to practice on them, but it wasn't the same as feeling diverse friendship that I do among other different groups of people.

Whew. Mostly, I think my resentment comes from the need for people to feel like they have to define themselves by their deafness. They feel threatened when someone challenges their comfort zone and boundaries, when really its just perspective.

For me, I get more self conscious when people attribute some of my behavior to other possible causes, because I don't always broadcast that I'm deaf. I have been told more than once that at first impression I can come off snobbish because I don't talk a lot in a large group; this is just simply because it takes so much effort and concentration to follow the conversation, there's no way I can stay with it enough to even join in. Any groups over 3-4 people (and this being people I know really well) can be exhausting. Add in a dim restaurant environment, and I might as well be playing Balderdash, and just have random one liner conversations.