Stereotyping Deaf People's Ability To Communicate With Hearing People Fluently

After reading Deaf Again, I can imagine some points about deaf people’ lives. It is really hard when someone tries to fit into something but it is not for he or she. I realize that the words “Never mind,” or “It is not important” can hurt someone. Moreover, I extremely admire the author, Mark Drolsbaugh, and other Deaf people because they are very patient and they are not easy feel down like hearing people.

While reading " Deaf in America: Voices From A Culture " I notice the purpose of this book was to wrote about Deaf people in a new and different way. The book main focus is that Deaf people have a condition that they can't hear. The culture of Deaf people is what both authors want to begin yo betray. What I found interesting while reading is that the majority of indidivauls within the community of Deaf people do not join it at birth. While reading these chapters I've seen both auhtors try to present the culture from the inside to discover how Deaf people describe themselves and how they think about their lives.

Also, the movie showed that comments on personal appearance are different in deaf culture and hearing culture. And again, on this topic, deaf people are also more straight up. If they see their friends look fat they will tell them right away to

I think that all parents with deaf children should embrace their child and their new culture and learn the language that is most easy for their child to communicate in. Most deaf children feel lonely and abandoned from their families because no one ever bothers to include them into family conversations. Whenever the deaf person would ask what's going on, they would say “Oh we'll tell you later.” Always the same thing and deaf people are tired of it. They want to know now and be included! It's not fair that they have to be left out just because they're deaf. It causes depression and resentment in the deaf person when the family constantly excludes the deaf family member. In some situations, deafness was viewed as evil. One man said that his aunt told him that he must have been a bad man in his past-life and as punishment, he was born deaf in this life-time.

In the movie they show many people who share their stories of oppression due to the fact that they are either deaf or hard of hearing. They discuss that they don't want to be seen as people who need help or want sympathy because being deaf is not a disability. In the movie they state just some of the misconceptions that people have of deaf people. One being that they can’t do the same jobs as hearing people because its hard for them and theyre going to need assistance; that is not true; it’s sad that people believe that just because they can’t hear that they’re anything less than intelligent in a certain field.

I wasn’t expecting that. After viewing the movie I understand better now why even if some deaf people can use their voices, they don’t because it seems like it would lead to a one-way conversation. Although the hearing person would understand what the deaf person was conveying, the deaf person would not be able to understand the hearing person without lip reading or using sign language.

In mainstream American society, we tend to approach deafness as a defect. Helen Keller is alleged to have said, "Blindness cuts people off from things; deafness cuts people off from people." (rnib.org) This seems a very accurate description of what Keller's world must have been. We as hearing people tend to pity deaf people, or, if they succeed in the hearing world, admire them for overcoming a severe handicap. We tend to look at signing as an inferior substitute for "real" communication. We assume that all deaf people will try to lip-read and we applaud deaf people who use their voices to show us how far they have come from the grips of their disability. Given this climate, many hearing people are surprised, as I was at

The documentary, Through Deaf Eyes, is a two hour film that focuses on all things related to Deaf life over the span of 200 years. The documentary includes interviews of people who have made a significant impact on the Deaf community, including actress Marlee Matlin and various people who work or either have worked at deaf schools such as Gallaudet University. Before watching this documentary or even before signing up for this ASL course I knew a little bit about Deaf culture through my own personal experience. After watching this documentary I have learned so many different interesting facts and now I have a whole new perspective on the Deaf culture.

For my Deaf event, I attended Deaf Coffee Night at Starbucks. When I walked in, I was happy to be able to look around and see people communicate through the use of only their hands, body and faces. I was also encouraged by the fact that I understood a majority of the signs I saw. After I ordered my drink, I approached a table of two people who were using ASL and I introduced myself. One person at the table was hearing while the other was Deaf, but both were happy to include me in their conversation. We talked for quite awhile about each of our lives. It was interesting to notice that throughout our conversation, the three of us were equally engaged in the conversation at hand about the lives of these strangers. This is a lot different then most conversations in the hearing world since most of the time we do not talk about our lives for that long and when listening to the lives of other people we do not actually care to pay close attention.

Most of the resources I used were found on Galluadet’s website, so there are no stereotypes on there that aren’t accurate. The difference between the stereotype of a disability and an actual disability is that the stereotypes of a disability are what people believe to be true. Actual disabilities are observable facts, and what some would call ‘not politically correct’ (compared to the stereotypes) that are not based on the media. Some common stereotypes of people who are deaf include: they’re not as intelligent, all deaf people communicate by signing, their lives are completely different than those of hearing people’s, they all lip read, and all of them want to be part of the hearing culture. In actuality, hearing doesn’t correlate with intelligence, not every deaf person uses sign language, their lives are just like those of hearing people just slightly more limited, a lot of deaf people can’t lip read, and not all deaf people want to be part of the hearing culture.

The deaf community does not see their hearing impairment as a disability but as a culture which includes a history of discrimination, racial prejudice, and segregation. According to PBS home video “Through Deaf Eyes,” there are thirty-five million Americans that are hard of hearing (Hott, Garey & et al., 2007) . Out of the thirty-five million an estimated 300,000 people are completely deaf. There are over ninety percent of deaf people who have hearing parents. Also, most deaf parents have hearing children. With this being the exemplification, deaf people communicate on a more intimate and significant level with hearing people all their lives. “Deaf people can be found in every ethnic group, every region, and every economic class.” The

I was interested in immersing myself with this group because they are a community of people that I’ve often wondered about. I’ve always wondered about the way they communicate with others and was it hard being deaf or hearing impaired in some ways. As myself, I learned that most people feel uncomfortable when meeting a Deaf person for the first time and this is very normal. When we communicate with people, we generally don’t have to think about the process. When faced with a Deaf person, we are uncertain which rules apply. We don’t know where to look, or how fast or loud to speak. When the Deaf person gives us a look of confusion, we don’t know how to correct the problem. Accept the fact that your initial

At first Daphne’s new family was not aware of how important sign language and deaf awareness was for her. After a while Daphne’s mother, Regina, told her birth parents and her new family that this was something very important to Daphne. Throughout the show Daphne, and the deaf community in the show, have to face different challenges and discrimination due to their deafness. In this show, we as a hearing community become aware of a lot of difficulties people that are deaf have to face. This show demonstrated that deaf and hard of hearing people are capable of doing what hearing people can do, sometimes even more.

It is easy to see why Deaf culture is so critical of those who assimilate with hearing culture because the Deaf have had a history of struggle and discrimination. Hearing culture has been critical of what Deaf people are able to do and have denied their existence. In the past American deaf people have been denied the right to vote, to marry, and to raise children (Halpern). Deaf children often were denied education, grew up illiterate, or grew up with no real language because at one point in time sign language was not allowed (Halpern).

The deaf community does not see their hearing impairment as a disability but as a culture which includes a history of discrimination, racial prejudice, and segregation. According to an online transcript,“Through Deaf Eyes” (Weta and Florentine films/Hott productions Inc., 2007) there are thirty-five million Americans that are hard of hearing. Out of the thirty-five million an estimated 300,000 people are completely deaf. There are ninety percent of deaf people who have hearing parents (Halpern, C., 1996). Also, most deaf parents have hearing children. With this being the exemplification, deaf people communicate on a more intimate and significant level with hearing people all their lives. “Deaf people can be found in every ethnic group,