On Excessive Attachment to Culture

Recently, I learned about two deaf women that intentionally conceived a deaf baby by using artificial insemination. This really is a symptom of the thing that troubles me the most about deaf culture: its exclusivity and self-protectiveness. Its monoculture tendencies.

( Deaf Monoculture )

But that's not the complete story.

The Goods of Deaf Culture

I touched upon this a bit in the last essay. Without the actions of hearing people, we (as in deaf people) wouldn't be where we are today, but a great part of our gains come from the activism ingrained into deaf culture. One celebrated event is a protest demanding a deaf president of Gallaudet University after yet another hearing president was chosen for that all-deaf university. They got their desired deaf president. Understanding this might be tough, until one realizes that the deaf people felt they weren't getting a say in their own university. So they decided to assert themselves.

( Why this situation arose )

I needed to write both those two posts on deaf culture, to express my own misgivings, and to restore my perspective of the whole thing to a more balanced one.