Disability Services

I looked up the Disability Services offered at Bowling Green and Ohio State for deaf and hard of hearing students (at http://www.bgsu.edu/offices/sa/disability/page18309.html and http://ods.osu.edu/services/).  Compared to Bowling Green State University’s website, there are more resources directly available to prospective students perusing the website.  The website offers tips on how to transition to college, such as contacting the Office of Disability Services directly and immediately.  It also details the types of classes that will best prepare a student for the types of classes that are offered at Ohio State.  It also provides very detailed instructions on how to apply and register with the ODS.  They also offer a College Day specifically for high school students, families, and counselors to attend to really provide a specialized orientation and advice for these students.  Though only one day, this special session just for these students really send the nonverbal message that these students are valued at the institution.

Both Bowling Green and Ohio State offer scholarships for students with disabilities.  They both also provide voter registration services so that students won’t need to maneuver outside of campus without resources.  BGSU will lend out FM amplification systems for academic purposes.  They also provide Typewell Meaning-for-Meaning Translation, where a trained Typewell captionist uses two laptop computers provided by the DS Office to transmit a meaning-for-meaning translation of the content of classes and campus events. This information is simultaneously read by the attending student.  They also provide Computer Assisted Real-Time Captioning (CART) - also referred to as real time captioning (the instant translation of the spoken word into English text using a stenotype machine, notebook computer, and realtime software). The text is displayed on the computer screen, which is located in front of the student.  They also offer interpreting services up to 3 days in advance.  Ohio State also offers these services.  They request that you request interpretation as soon as possible. They cannot guarantee interpreting services less than seven days in advance.  When I first read Bowling Green’s deadline of three days, I remembered thinking that it was asking students to know way in advance, which makes Ohio State’s much more daunting.  At the same time though, this makes sense because Ohio State is so much larger than Bowling Green.  However, this really forces students to plan ahead and know what kind of programs and events they would want to attend, way in advance.  This puts a lot of pressure on these students, and could exclude them from joining in impromptu social activities, or joining friends on a floor to an event or program.  On the flip side, the webpage also offers ASL events both on and off-campus, including events sponsored by the ASL Club, Deaf churches, and other organizations including Deaf Women of Ohio, which is an organization that Lindsay may legitimately want to be a part of that is still in the Columbus area (http://www.deafwomenofohio.com/main_page.html).

Deaf Culture

I think something extremely crucial to this process is determining if she is deaf or Deaf.  There is definitely a difference.  I spoke with my friend Kayla from Columbus (the one who is working on ASL certification) about the differences between the “d” and the “D”.  Members of this big-D Deaf community do not view being deaf as a disability, but as a difference in human experience.  It can include family members of those who are deaf and hard of hearing and interpreters that identify with the culture, but does not automatically include all who are deaf and/ or hard of hearing.

Before the 19^th century, deaf individuals lived very solitary lives among predominantly hearing people.  After this, Deaf culture was mainly established in Deaf schools and other social clubs.  Joining the Deaf community can happen at any time in one’s life depending on when one loses the ability to hear, the presence of a community where he or she resides, etc.  As mentioned in the first article, deafness is not really genetic.  While 50% of all deafness is caused by genetics, only 5% of all deaf people have deaf parents, which makes this an atypical social identity.

It’s also unique in the sense that there isn’t just one Deaf culture, but varied groups all around the world, even regionally.  Some typical values of the Deaf culture include a positive connotation with being d/Deaf, a distaste for Cochlear Implants (as it acknowledges deafness as a disability), using sign language as the main form of communication, as well as being more collectivistic (within the Deaf culture) as opposed to individualistic, like the rest of American culture.  There are some behavioral norms as well.  Certain conversation etiquette, such as, you should never walk in between a signed conversation (which makes sense, it’s the same as interrupting).  It is important to be as detailed as possible when describing environments or timing.  Arriving early is standard in Deaf culture.  When meeting someone new, a person of the Deaf community always seeks to find something in common with the other person, in a desire for to find connection.  As most communities are small, they seek to find common ground.

 I’ve decided to name my voice Lindsay.  I’m still not entirely sure how involved I really want her to be with the Deaf community, since she has a predominantly hearing family.  Though family members can be indoctrinated into the Deaf community, Kayla expressed that many in the Deaf community are still wary of all hearing people trying to get involved with the Deaf culture (including interpreters), so I imagine that it might have been very difficult for the family to try to become part of the Deaf culture, which might cause Lindsey to feel disjoint with truly identifying with the community.  I think that Lindsay was born hearing and lost her hearing ability at an early age because of a high fever, which explains why she can speak a bit.  She is mostly deaf with an extremely weak sense of hearing.

The Launching Point

Another semester, another voice journal...
This semester, it took me awhile to think about what voice I wanted to investigate and learn more about this semester.  In the end, I ended up with a deaf woman.  I came to this conclusion rather unexpectedly.  I was sitting in my apartment, idly flipping through my mental catalog of possible voices and nonchalantly looking around my apartment at my various movie, art, and musician posters, when I realized how much of my experiences were based on sound.  Being a music major, music is clearly something that is dear to my heart and thinking patterns, and something I take for granted, and so, an appropriate challenge for myself would be to attempt an experience without sound.
It also made me realize that I actually know many people who have deaf friends or siblings or study American Sign Language, which means that it can't be that uncommon.  Which means that there must be several in higher education today.  I'm trying to find more hard facts/ statistics about the actual number of college students who are deaf.
I have a plan of action.  First of all, I'm going to speak with my friends and read material about deaf culture in general.  Then I'm going to make more definitive decisions about my student.  Then I can tackle reading journal articles, setting up some interviews with personnel in the Office of Disabilities, and investing in deaf community in Bowling Green or a student organization.
I know that there are many facets within deaf identity (as in all identities), which include whether the student was born deaf, the age in which she lost hearing, whether or not she is competent in ASL, if any one else in her family is deaf, how involved the student is in the deaf community, and the degree of deafness.  I found this article, while searching for basic statistics:  Deafness and the Riddle of Identity
I found this article particularly insightful for many reasons.
1.) It defines people who are deaf as a colonized, ethnic, linguistic minority
2.) It scratches the surface that there are different forms of sign language: ASL (a critical piece of the deaf identity) and Pidgin Signed Language (PSE)- a mixture of ASL and English (an equivalent to "broken English").
3.)  It covered some of the history of the deaf identity and the prejudices that have come with it, such as being "dumb without a language" and until very recently being ignored by society.
4.) It identifies the flaws of attempting to define deafness into a particular identity BECAUSE there are so many different factors.  The point the author focuses on particularly is whether or not a person is a native user of ASL, which marginalizes so many others that "happily consider themselves" as deaf.
5.)  This quote: "While it is true that many deaf people share a common culture, history, language, and social behavior, with the advent of the Internet, the mainstreaming of deaf students into regular classrooms, the decline of residential schooling for the deaf, and the demise of deaf clubs (where deaf people in large cities gathered regularly to socialize), it is harder to argue that the deaf are significantly different from the nondeaf... Changes in the overall culture have to some degree erased the sense of "otherness" that the deaf historically have held on to as a way of defining themselves. That is why places like Gallaudet have come to be seen nostalgically as the "home" of deaf people and deaf culture: They continue to define the deaf as a separate cultural group."
6.) Often times being deaf is only "one generation thick", meaning more often than not, a person's hearing ability differs between generations, as it is often not something that gets "genetically passed on".


The article included some other factors that are considered "crucial to pure deafness", such as a certain amused/ cynical attitude toward the "hearing world".  One of my best friends from college is currently becoming certified in ASL, and I remember her explaining this contempt for the hearing through her many encounters with the deaf community, and how as her skills improved, the contempt lessened, though never fully went away.  I am interested in hearing more insights from her as a hearing person in the deaf community and also to connect with the friends that she has made in the deaf community.


I found MANY articles on the Chronicle concerning the issues of students who are deaf in higher education and the institutions that serve them (or the ones that do not).  I am excited to begin this journey.


Some decisions I can make about my voice.  She is a woman.  Her parents and siblings are hearing.  She uses ASL fluently, but also lip reads and speak a little.  Her family is supportive and learned ASL in order to communicate with her more efficiently.  I feel that I will need to learn more about deaf culture before I can move much further from here.  I am unsure of how involved she is with her deaf community or if the deaf community even accepts her and/or her family fully because she lip reads and speaks.