Tag: sign

The Hearing Loss Spectrum, Between the Hearing World and Deaf Culture [en]

As the founding editor of Phonak’s community blog “Open Ears” (now part of “Hearing Like Me“) I contributed a series of articles on hearing loss between 2014 and 2015. Here they are.

Since becoming the editor of this blog, one thing I’ve struggled with is the diversity of “hearing loss” experiences we would like to reflect. This is parallel with all the questions related to the minefield of hearing-related terminology, which we’ve touched upon in a couple of past articles. I actually drafted another article on the topic after Christina wrote hers about reclaiming the term “hearing impaired” for herself. But it’s been sitting there because I didn’t feel I was managing to get it right. And because I’m very much afraid of saying the wrong thing on a loaded topic (as I am with this very post).

In what I’ll call the “hearing loss spectrum”, for lack of a better expression, there is a reasonably obvious distinction, the importance of which was recently brought to my attention on a couple of occasions. Not that I wasn’t aware of it before, but I’ve come to a deeper understanding of it — and of its relevance to the editorial line of Open Ears (part of my job here).

The distinction is the following: is your primary means of communication through vocal speech, or signed language? Of course there are people who use both, but for most or us I think, it is one or the other. Is your culture hearing culture, or Deaf culture?

About a month ago I heard that Christine Sun Kim was giving a talk at the MIT Media Lab. Christine is a sound artist — and she’s deaf. Of course this made me curious, and I thought it would be interesting to talk about her work on Open Ears (which I’m doing, actually, by writing this ;-)). Then the “rift” between parts of the “hearing loss” and “deaf” communities was pointed out to me. My initial reaction was “no big deal, Open Ears is about the whole ‘hearing loss spectrum’.”

But in the days that followed, and as I read more about Christine’s work, and watched videos, and explored more about deaf language and culture [PDF], I realised that I was missing something.

Hearing technology (hearing aids and cochlear implants, mainly) is about making it possible for those who want it to take part in hearing culture as normally as possible even though their “lesser hearing” makes this difficult, to varying degrees. In that respect, this blog is clearly about the hearing world.

A couple of weeks later, I met a woman whose son is deaf. He can hear very loud sounds (ambulances etc.) with the help of a powerful hearing aid, but that’s it. They sign, of course. She was telling me about how extremely difficult our Swiss ideal of “total integration in the classroom” was for deaf kids (like asking little hearing kids to take part in a class full of telepaths).

Her story kind of drove home for me how very different it is to be part of hearing or deaf culture — deafness here as a linguistic and culture minority: the Deaf.

And so, yes, there is a whole spectrum of hearing loss. But at some point there are two worlds that are culturally different and communicate via different mediums (oral speech or sign). To some extent, they are related to degrees of hearing loss, but not necessarily.

This is quite obvious, I’m aware. It’s not a new idea for me either. But as an editor who is forever thinking about and questioning the editorial line of this blog (do we write about this? and what about this? and this? or not?), these two encounters helped me clarify that we do not want to encroach upon the territory of all the great Deaf publications out there, and that Open Ears respectfully remains on the “hearing culture” side of hearing loss.

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Indian Things I Love [en]

I’m regularly told that I give a bad image of India (the horror stories and all that). Here is some of the nice stuff that I never write about. Things I like about India.

I’m regularly told that I give a bad image of India (the horror stories and all that). Here is some of the nice stuff that I never write about. Things I like about India:

  • the rivers
  • poha
  • riding on the back of Madhav or Shinde’s bikes
  • the shopping stalls near Laxmi Rd
  • walking in the university campus
  • going to the movies
  • mad shopping binges
  • kathi rolls and kheer kadam from Radhika’s
  • chay
  • the smell of incense and fresh coriander
  • people who smile at me or compliment my dress
  • rickshaw drivers who go by the meter
  • chatting with people on the train
  • coloured clothes and cloth
  • travelling by train
  • shopping
  • changes of plans and surprises when they go the way I want them to
  • painted signs and boards
  • rangoli
  • sari bags
  • krack cream
  • the dampness of the air on arrival in Bombay airport
  • kulfi and gulab jamun
  • butter naan and butter chicken
  • the warmth
  • having all the time in the world to take my bath and eat my breakfast
  • glass bangles and silver anklets
  • reading for days on end
  • children in school uniforms
  • eating on the kitchen floor
  • the cup of tea offered by the internet café manager because I’m waiting for the end of the power outage
  • Hindi and Indian English
  • negociating seating arrangements and luggage storage with fellow train-passengers
  • sticking 46 large stamps on the 6.5kg book parcel I’m sending home
  • the Kal Ho Na Ho ringtone on Anita’s cellphone
  • sweet-smelling flowers in the night
  • Hindi music in the car
  • chay with milk straight out of the goat’s udder at Taramai’s

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Savitri III [en]

At every moment we make an unalterable decision. When I wrote to you in the beginning, I made one.

At every moment we make an unalterable decision. When I wrote to you in the beginning, I made one. I made another when I invited you to Tirupet. After you had been and gone, when I gave you that string of answers to your questions, then again I made a decision. I have not altered it. The psychological basis of my behaviour did not come in the way of this. Only I did not get the response I wanted. Had I got it, I would have come anywhere with you, done anythng for you. Every girl, the instant she is born, comes prepared to leave her mother and her father.

You might perhaps say that you too expected a response and that you did not get it. How can I give an answer to this? To tell you the truth, one ought to be able to arrive at these decisions without resorting to the language of appeal and response.

Now, after writing all this, I feel embarrassed. If reading this causes you any sorrow then forget me for all time.

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