[Ohio-talk] Braille Monitor article concerning deafblind cultures

Wed Apr 1 20:25:26 UTC 2015

This article made me think of 2 men, both in their 40s or 50s, who had
Ushers.  They were born totally deaf and developed RP in adulthood.
They both wanted to learn braille so, using an SSP to communicate,
they accomplished their goal.  One of the men is very active in the
Deaf-blind community in Cincinnati and would be a great addition to
the NFB.  The other man would also be a great addition, but did not
get involved in groups.  I like the article but how do we reach out to
this population?

On 4/1/15, Kaiti Shelton via Ohio-talk <ohio-talk at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> Though I am a deafblind coordinator and this article is therefore of
> particular interest to me, I think it is one we should all read so
> that we can better understand the dilemma we're facing when we say we
> want to start a deafblind division.  I've pasted it here for your
> convenience.
>
> In the community we have a very rich history, including two distinct
> cultures which have been so severely separated from one another by
> their language that there doesn't seem to be any evidence they were
> even aware of one another's existence until sometime after the rise of
> the information age.
>
>
> First there is the Deaf-blind, with a capital D. These are folks from
> the Deaf culture who, for one reason or another, have become blind.
> They may have been born into deaf families and later experienced the
> loss of vision. People who self-identify as Deaf with a capital D
> consider themselves part of a relatively isolated nondisabled
> community. They are isolated by their language from the community at
> large. They often are able to communicate with members of the hearing
> community through various adaptive means but choose to maintain close
> association among themselves.
>
>
> Part of the reason for their choice to isolate themselves lies in the
> history of Deaf people in this country. At one time educators believed
> that using hand signs was a lower form of communication--not fit for
> humans. Hearing teachers at residential schools for the Deaf forced
> Deaf children to read lips and to practice using their voices. Deaf
> students spent long, weary hours working with speech therapists and
> were forbidden from using their language of choice. Because of this
> oppression, which continued for years, American Sign Language (ASL)
> was nearly extinguished. A whole generation of Deaf students kept the
> language alive by sneaking signs with each other at night in their
> dormitory rooms.
>
>
> If a student had any amount of residual hearing, he or she was forced
> to wear hearing aids. Hearing aid technology was not very evolved
> during this time; the devices were not very useful, plus they were
> highly uncomfortable. It was a tradition among Deaf children upon
> completing school to throw away their hearing aids in celebration of
> their new freedom.
>
>
> Because of all the oppression by the hearing educators, this
> generation of Deaf people learned to distrust the hearing community.
> That distrust continues today and is perpetuated by incidents such as
> the failure of institutions such as hospitals and the judicial system
> to hire qualified interpreters when serving a Deaf person, resulting
> in horror stories about wrongful incarceration, withheld medical
> treatment, etc. A common cruelty involves police officers restraining
> the wrists of a Deaf person, who then is unable to use his or her
> hands to communicate with an interpreter if one is present.
>
>
> Such distrust and animosity between the Deaf and hearing cultures
> extends to blind folks who, for various reasons, have lost their
> hearing. This group of deaf-blind people [deaf-blind being hyphenated
> but in lower case] do not naturally self-identify as deaf-blind. They
> have likely started to come to terms with their blindness through
> association with groups such as the NFB. The tragedy here is that, in
> the past, the true model of the independent vanilla blind did not
> include anyone who had "something else wrong with them." If one had a
> hearing loss, one might as well remain in an institution or on the
> street corner holding out a hat. The "hearing" deaf-blind person was
> not likely to speak out and self-advocate. The deaf-blind from the
> hearing culture were not seen any differently from the hearing
> population in general in the eyes of the Deaf and Deaf-blind from the
> Deaf culture.
>
>
> Furthermore, since the deaf-blind with a lower-case D did not learn to
> use ASL, communication between the two deaf-blind cultures was, for
> all intents and purposes, impossible. In rare circumstances, where the
> two groups were placed together, the result was extremely
> uncomfortable. Each group ignored the other. The act of ignoring was
> interpreted by the other group as snobbery.
>
>
> I am a deaf-blind person who is from the hearing culture. My hearing
> loss was so severe that I made the choice to study at a total
> immersion facility for several months in order to learn sign language.
> All my teachers were Deaf. Upon completing my course of study, I had
> regained the ability to communicate; yet I could still not communicate
> with anyone I had known before I began my study. Hence I would need to
> choose the culture to which I would belong. Should I say good-bye to
> all my friends and family? They were not about to learn to sign.
>
>
> I was very fortunate that, within two or three years of learning ASL,
> I was given the opportunity to qualify for cochlear implants. They
> were both successful, and I have my life back as a blind person. But
> most others are not so fortunate.
>
>
> So now we have two different groups of DB [deaf blind] folks who can't
> communicate with each other. They have the same disability. Both have
> a combined vision and hearing loss, both can benefit from an SSP
> [Support Service Provider], and both can benefit from Braille. There
> are some DB folks who cross over the culture line. We see them at our
> DB Seminar during our NFB Convention. We cannot ignore them. They
> cannot ignore us. They need the NFB philosophy. We need them behind us
> and with us when we go to Capitol Hill someday to ask for a national
> SSP Program. When I go to one of their meetings, because they know me
> as one of their supporters, they provide me with a voice interpreter.
> The NFB has begun providing interpreters for DB attendees who use ASL.
> The DB Division is agonizing over the cost of ASL interpreters.
>
> But relationships between these two groups are very difficult to
> forge. These relationships must be developed over time, with patience
> enough to allow the formulation of trust. As Pam Allen has said to me
> regarding the differences that set us apart, the key is education. We
> will not overcome the damage that history has done unless we first
> understand what will be required to heal the wounds.
>
> --
> Kaiti Shelton
> University of Dayton 2016.
> Music Therapy, Psychology, Philosophy
> President, Ohio Association of Blind Students
> Sigma Alpha Iota-Delta Sigma
>
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-- 
Marianne Denning, TVI, MA
Teacher of students who are blind or visually impaired
(513) 607-6053