Lately I have read a new book called Understanding Deaf Culture: In Search of Deafhood
Today a lot of people don’t know the definition of deaf or hard of hearing and they never will because they won’t give themselves the chance to learn. Even most of the people don’t know that deaf and hard of hearing people have their own culture, because they do and it’s my culture too considering I am hard of hearing. It’s tough as it is today in America trying to socialize with other people because not everyone know American Sign Language which is what gives us some difficult time trying to mingle with everyone and as well trying to get a job or more so our dream. Every time when we try to social with other people it gets awkward because they don’t know how to respond back to us because it requires our language to communicate which is American Sign Language (ASL).
Everywhere we go there will always be barrier and what is in our way of getting the things done for ourselves such as job or something that we need to make our lifestyle easier? Hearing people. When we say hearing people means anyone who can hear in case if you don’t know. Every time we would go in a store to buy something that need communication, how are we able to respond? They don’t know sign language to communicate with us even with basic sign language. What about education? We need some education and to get some education we need school and college to attend to learn right? The problem is that the mainstream school or college teachers doesn’t know how to communicate with us, by that using sign language which can be easily learned by through online or taking American Sign Language classes that offers all over in the place especially in some cities.
American Sign Language is the second language in America and is the most second important language to know in America when everyone thought it is Spanish when it isn’t because the true languages for America should be English AND American Sign Language but isn’t because the alternative language in America would be Spanish. In my belief that everyone who have business should at least have American Sign Language in their résumé or as their second language because I cannot fathom how important it is to learn American Sign Language because in America the quarter population, well a bit less than a quarter of population in America is deaf and hard of hearing and our language is American Sign Language. And that’s several thousands of potential customers you could be getting which could definitely help you in revenue in some way or give our money to the business that we are comfortable with giving. Because when we go to local business and when we need to communicate with someone to learn about certain things or question about the products they are selling, if they don’t have American Sign Language as their second language then they would lose their potential customers.
Deaf and hard of hearing is the biggest problem in America now especially when it comes to civil rights, lifestyle and among others. We can give a fair trade to some businesses, we work to earn the money to give the money to you in return you learn another language such as American Sign Language to get the money that we worked hard for. I think that’s fair trade. That is just an example but actually the biggest problem in deaf community would be the communication barriers. We hardly can break the barriers it’s because nobody give us the chance to break it and be connected with America’s people. Some think there’s something wrong with us just because we are deaf or hard of hearing, back in the days when people becomes deaf or hard of hearing the people would call us “broke” and that’s a true story. But thankfully it’s not like that in America anymore and people starts to acknowledge about us and our culture. Only difference between us deaf and hard of hearing and you all hearing people is that we cannot hear at all (deaf) or we only can hear very little (hard of hearing – such as loud alarms, speakers with subwoofer and among other that needs very high volumes of sound). As physical we function exact as any of you function. Our dream? We hope that one of these day where everyone can be more comfortable with us and start give us a chance to work together or to bond together and that would be the beginner of breaking the barriers. Of course we are always willing to offer lessons for American Sign Language but only if you ask of us to and give us a chance to do so.
Deaf and Hard of Hearing is growing larger and larger everyday and will continue to do so and only I can hope is that our next generations will have it better than our current generation. But yes the book I am recommending is a fantastic book to read and definitely can teach you the meaning of deaf and learn deaf culture which is amazing.
Thank you for reading this article and please keep checking back here in case if I am writing more articles soon and I hope every one of you have a great night and please stay safe wherever you are or whatever you are doing. I greatly appreciate for every one of your time and your loyalty for being readers and stick with JoshiesWorld still to this day. If it wasn’t for any of you I wouldn’t be encouraged to write. Blogging is my passion as you could see and anyone I encourage to blog as well.
- Joshie.
Note: If you would like to buy a book and read this book that I am recommending, you can click the link in the title of book in the beginning of sentence above or you can click below here by Amazon:
