kajarainbow (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
kajarainbow) wrote2004-09-22 05:51 pm
kajarainbow) wrote2004-09-22 05:51 pm
Entry tags:
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.
Deaf history is filled with examples of hearing people closely associated with us deaf people, even working to benefit us, but ultimately holding viewpoints not beneficial to us. For an example, just look back for my post about Alexander Graham Bell and his views on deaf marriage, it's in my 'memories' if you need help finding it. I'm sure you fellow transsexuals will understand this perfectly well. Nevertheless, many hearing supporters haven't been like this, and we needed them to get to where we are.
Before, we weren't even viewed as thinking humans. We weren't viewed as capable of thinking, of being full individuals. People didn't even really bother to educate us. It has taken efforts by hearing people to help us achieve our potentials despite other hearing people's underwhelming expectations for us, to form methods of educating the deaf, using sign language. It has taken deaf people's installed beliefs in their own capacities, working to help future generations develop their potentials and working to help ensure greater rights for the deaf.
But, anyway, deaf culture is a rife with activism, with positive thinking, overall with culture and meme jamming to overcome the notions that we aren't capable, the lowered expectations many hearing people have of us. I'm beginning to think I need this. That I should learn to to take the positive aspects of deaf culture, and not be turned off enough by the distasteful examples or the many uninteresting people I encountered in high school to want to withdraw entirely from contact with other deaf people like I've been doing.
The really important thing about the protest demanding a deaf university president was the message that we can take care of ourselves, that we don't necessarily require hearing people to minister to all our affairs. It was more an affirmation of our own capacities than an action of xenophobia.
After all, the lesbian couple's selecting for deaf children is really just a result of this positive propaganda being carried to excesses. The more positive lives being led by the deaf is another result, and a very good one.
I'm beginning to think now that I didn't take the best choice toward deaf culture. I choose to simply withdraw from it all, good and bad. What I really needed to take was the third path, the third side of the fence that many deaf people indeed are taking today, embracing the self-affirming virtues of deaf culture while reaching out to hearing people.
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.
Deaf history is filled with examples of hearing people closely associated with us deaf people, even working to benefit us, but ultimately holding viewpoints not beneficial to us. For an example, just look back for my post about Alexander Graham Bell and his views on deaf marriage, it's in my 'memories' if you need help finding it. I'm sure you fellow transsexuals will understand this perfectly well. Nevertheless, many hearing supporters haven't been like this, and we needed them to get to where we are.
Before, we weren't even viewed as thinking humans. We weren't viewed as capable of thinking, of being full individuals. People didn't even really bother to educate us. It has taken efforts by hearing people to help us achieve our potentials despite other hearing people's underwhelming expectations for us, to form methods of educating the deaf, using sign language. It has taken deaf people's installed beliefs in their own capacities, working to help future generations develop their potentials and working to help ensure greater rights for the deaf.
But, anyway, deaf culture is a rife with activism, with positive thinking, overall with culture and meme jamming to overcome the notions that we aren't capable, the lowered expectations many hearing people have of us. I'm beginning to think I need this. That I should learn to to take the positive aspects of deaf culture, and not be turned off enough by the distasteful examples or the many uninteresting people I encountered in high school to want to withdraw entirely from contact with other deaf people like I've been doing.
The really important thing about the protest demanding a deaf university president was the message that we can take care of ourselves, that we don't necessarily require hearing people to minister to all our affairs. It was more an affirmation of our own capacities than an action of xenophobia.
After all, the lesbian couple's selecting for deaf children is really just a result of this positive propaganda being carried to excesses. The more positive lives being led by the deaf is another result, and a very good one.
I'm beginning to think now that I didn't take the best choice toward deaf culture. I choose to simply withdraw from it all, good and bad. What I really needed to take was the third path, the third side of the fence that many deaf people indeed are taking today, embracing the self-affirming virtues of deaf culture while reaching out to hearing people.
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.