Two Worlds: The Deaf and Hearing Supremacists

Having orbitted the sun 55 times, I'm caught between two worlds: the one my families perceived and the one that hearing people have created around us. Throughout my life, I realized that the time had come to impart to the world a living language, American Sign Language (ASL) that hearing supremacists claim is dying or fading out. But this is a modern myth that Deaf children with and without cochlear implants disprove; ASL is not so gone that we cannot use it.

Every year when I was in school ... and college ... I was told again and again to use my voice. They told me that I have a very good voice. Although I speak in monotonous utterances, my speech is intelligible. Whenever I met hearing people working with the Deaf for the first time, they usually complimented my voice and then began to ask about my being Deaf and amplification. I've been Deaf all my life, and I never have personal hearing aids.

I never loose my hearing because I was born Deaf. Genetics researchers and counselors suggested that I have the Waardenberg syndrome. I have premature grey hair, one of many symptoms. It has nothing to do with my ability to speak.

I should tell how many different forms of punsihments I had while growing up. In school, my hands were slapped with a ruler for signing, my face slapped with a hand for using facial expressions, and in my college years, my grades were lowered by a letter for not using my voice. I was often coerced in another room or building so that the school could determine whether I was a bad influence among my own peers. I was naughty because I didn't look or behave like a hearing person.

I need also to tell about some of my former Deaf supervisors who were hearing supremacists. Whenever we were together without hearing people around, they were like culturally Deaf people. However, when a hearing person came in, they became hypocritical. I simply went ignored. They would speak without signing as if to tell them that ASL has no place in the work force.

As I resurrect my memories, perhaps you too will be revived to your own stirring remembrance. For only memory can bring to life the myth that hearing supremacists attempt to create about our being Deaf and our ability to speak.

Deaf people's ability to hear and to speak is so individualistic we need to realize that not all hearing people play piano.