Models of deafness

Audism is when someone is being discriminated against based on their ability to hear or not to hear. The term audism originally started in 19775 by a man named Tom Humphries, to describe how some people feel superior based on their ability to hear (Bauman 2004). It is a term the hearing community does not understand and many do not notice that they are becoming an audist. It can be seen in both the deaf community and the hearing community when people do not trust that someone deaf can make…

Tom Humphries lost all of his hearing at the age of six from exposure to antibiotics. However, he was raised around hearing people. Both of his parents were able to hear. Tom entered the Death community while he was in college; his entrance wasn’t planed. It was more of an accident. He entered the Death community by learning the Death culture and being around other people who was like himself, but from different back grounds. Even though Humphries’ been death for most of his life, his…

On Thursday, October 1st, I went to a Deaf Night Out event on UNCG’s campus. The event was held in the school of education and was a mix between a social and a presentation. Luke’s roommate and a few other students shared their experiences from studying abroad in Italy to learn Italian sign language. When I first arrived at the event I did not see anyone I knew. I very much felt like an outsider who was imposing. Then I found Luke and felt a little more comfortable. Everyone there knew each…

one’s existence. This quote literally emphasises the importance of language and its impact on life to the deaf community. The deaf community worldwide, a unique community, affirm with their uniqueness, not relating deafness as a disability at all. Instead, the deaf community sees deafness as a cultural and linguistic identity and not a communication barrier (National disability services, 2016). Sign language diversity and deaf culture distinguish the deaf community and their use of sign language…

Deafness, like any other attribute a human may have, may be perceived in a positive or a negative light. As hearing people make up the majority of the population, it is easy for people who cannot hear to be looked at differently. I was full of wonder upon hearing the title, Reframing: From Hearing Loss to Deaf Gain as I am very familiar with the term “hearing loss”, but not very familiar with the term “deaf gain”. I was expecting “deaf gain” to involve the advantages of being deaf that I do not…

Being deaf in a world that most of the people are hearing and don’t understand the deaf culture is very hard to live in. In my opinion I don’t know how they live or what they do or how they feel because no one told me their life style. I though their life is just the same as mine just have to go by way a different way but I didn’t know coving your mouth or whispering or not paying attention with your eye is distrustful because us hearing people can talk with looking at some in the eye or…

In mainstream society, we, as hearing people, tend to consider deafness as a defect. We tend to look at them with a feeling of pity. If they success in the hearing world, we will applaud them for overcoming a severe deficiency. We tend to consider signing as an inferior replacement for “real” language such as English or Spanish. We believe that all Deaf people will try to lip-read when communicating with hearing people as the only way to interact. Finally, when we heard about the devices such as…

Imagine yourself living in a community of people who are nothing like you, and will never become like you. In Varley’s “Persistence of Vision” the Keller community is full of deaf-blind people who have created their own way of living to better help themselves survive. The Kellerites are welcoming to any visitors that want to experience how they deaf-blind live, however, these visitors may not want to stay very long. Anyone who decides they want to step into the world of the deaf-blind society…

community interacts and accepts the deaf individual has a huge impact on their outlook on life. In Cece Bell's’ novel El Deafo, the protagonist Cece’s outlook on life changes throughout the novel as different people interact with her and learn about her deafness, while in the documentary Life Without Words the community in which Maria, the protagonist, lives in affects her in a different way. Her community does not quite accept and provide the same benefits as Cece’s and therefore affects her…

Deaf Again is an autobiography of the life of Mark Drolsbaugh. Mark analyzes and discusses the psychosocial and educational aspects of deafness by using experiences and his family’s encounters throughout his life. He begins with Sherry, Mark’s mother’s experience of his birth to exemplify how the deaf are treated due to the communication gap between the deaf and hearing. He then discusses experiences that impacted his psychosocial, emotional, and educational development from the time he was…