Deaf, Identity and Special Considerations

I believe there is no difference between recognizing American Sign Language as a language than recognizing Spanglish or Black English. All of us, regardless of the language that we speak, would like to be recognized as having an identity; our own language is part of it. If I were Deaf, I would also be fighting for the same rights.

Deaf people do not want to be seen as disabled, and I fully support their desire to be treated as equal. Maybe, I would think the same way if I were in their shoes. At the same time I believe that accommodations should be available for the Deaf that requests it. Although I admire their desire to be treated as equal, and I cannot imagine for me not to be able to hear, I still see not being able to hear as a physical impediment; therefore, I fully support special accommodations as needed.

Jairo Toro

Nov 1 post Gender roles

I am better late than never right? Ok I don't really know how I feel about this whole gender thing? I guess I am very close minded becasue I don't see a real problem in society today with gender roles being a big problem. In my immediate family some women work some stay at home. My wife who works would rather have kids and stay home. Most women in my life have no real hard feelings about gender roles. I treat the women in my life with the respect they deserve. I applaud any woman who chooses to work or stay at home. To me gender roles are labels we place on people there are always exceptions to the rule. I will probably get a crazy response to this from all of you saying I don't know what I am saying but the blog is foe expressing my views right???

deaf culture

Deaf people basically want to be acknowledged as merely people who speak a different language right? They are also angry because they do not want to be acknowledged as disabled people as well. So if they are to be acknowledged as having their own language isn't that sort of like accomodating disabled people? If we don't acknowledge them as being disabled does that mean that we should accomodate in public places like schools etc.? People who speak a foreign language posess the same biological capabilities as English speaking people. Therfore they are not disabled, rather just from a different culture. People who are deaf lack the physical ability to hear and need assistance in society beyond the sense of language.

Gender

I Find that the way we talk about men and women is totally different, men are put up on a pedestal reguardless of what they do. Women in this society are talked down upon, as if they are objects in a sense. The first step as men is to change the way we think about the people we desire most. This is a hard thing to do because in this society desire and ownership go hand in hand. To overcome this we must forget about sexual desires and focus on creating a human connection.

ps, better late than never...

Challenging Gender Roles

1.) If someone wanted to challenge gender roles in our society through public discourse, what might be ways to go about it?

There are many ways to challenge gender roles in our society through public discourse. One of the ways is to do exactly what I am doing right now. Blogging; it is a perfect way to get your ideas out to the public and have others share as well. In order to challenge gender roles in our society it is necessary to lead by example. In order to truly challenge this in society, I beleive one must be different than the typical male or female. People see how others interact, most males act similiar just like most females act similiar. I beleive that leading by example would raise the attention of more Americans about challenging gender roles.
In my opinion the best way to challenge gender roles is to get out into the public and discuss the issue. With the combination of public speech and leading by example it will eventually have other people challenging gender roles themself.
Other ways of challenging this issue would be: give out handouts, writing a book, starting a group where people can get together and talk, possibly getting a newspaper article to write your opinion, television interview, public presentations, etc...

Deafness recognized

While the deaf culture is struggling with thier identity along with the African Americans and Latinos. Yet ASL is a very distinct language that can only be understood if you are fluent in ASL. Spanish or any african language would be the same way, only understood by those who are fluent in the language. But Spanglish and Ebonics based on English with variations in the words or pronuncitations. There can still be a mutal understanding between someone who only speaks standard english and someone who speaks ebonics. Yet with ASL, there is going to be very diffucult communication of neither party speaks the others language. I think that the quote is saying that ASL is not recognized as a seperate langauage and that the speakers have to know it and use it to communicate. They are bound by limitations because they can not communicate with the general public as easily as someone who speaks ebonics or Spanglish. So while they are all seperate and deserve thier own regognition, ASL is very different than the others and deserves to be recognized as it's own language for the Deaf community to achieve greater acceptance.

challenging gender roles

To challenge gender roles is to challenge the values that are taught to children. There are examples of matriarchal societies, in past and present, that naturally cause different gender roles to be taught than the roles that are present in America.

*NERD ALERT* In one of my favorite episodes of Star Trek, the crew arrives at a planet that is controlled and governed by the women of the society, and naturally Kirk swoons the leader off her feet and instantly her values shift to those of 1960's America.

In the U.S., the discourse contained in the "Disney" or "chick-flick" fall in love and/or fairy tale style movies are an embedded part of our culture, they reflect and enforce the expectations and values of our society. They define to us at a subliminal level our own gender roles. There are plenty of movies (and T.V. shows) out there that use discourse to challenge the traditional idea of gender roles.

I suppose another way of challenging gender roles through discourse is the use of neutral gender words like "their" and "s/he". But, I think that usage feels uncomfortable and impersonal at times. Also the gender neutral words really only work on paper and not in spoken language. Gender and language have deep roots within each other.

Do men and and women really want to be treated as exact equals? Isn't it polite for a man to hold a door open for a woman, or has that now become rude, suggesting an amount of inequality?

Shifting gender roles are apparent today in that for the first time in U.S. history a female is a serious contender for the job in the White House. I think I have sensed an underlying feeling in listening to some radio talk show hosts (which is a form of public discourse) that the Presidency is and should be a man's job, but I think that is a feeling of older generations, I feel there's a good chance I will vote for Hillary Clinton. I think, people of younger generations have been socialized into being more accepting of the man in a woman's job or vice-versa through the challenging of gender roles in public discourse, but it is really hard to pin point exact examples of it happening.

Discomfort all around...

In one of the readings, a Deaf woman said, "When our language was acknowledged, we gained our freedom." How does this differ from speakers of Spanglish or Black English Vernacular's efforts to have those languages recognized?

I'd like to reference our discussion on Thursday regarding ASL and the ADA in response to this statement. No individual or group of people wants to be labeled as "disabled," which is why we have invented PC terms such as "differently abled" or "handicapable." The fact is, and I hate to be overly blunt, but deafness is a handicap to normal social interaction. While a non-native English speakers may find themselves in the US, completely unfamiliar with English, they still particiapate in spoken language, which increases their ability to learn and survive in a language/culture that is foreign to them because it is typically easier for a speaking/hearing individual to accept and adapt to someone who speaks a foreign language as opposed to someone who doesn't hear or speak (as is the case with many deaf individuals). Please keep in mind that I am writing solely from the perspective of the hearing individual who has, perhaps, never interacted with a deaf person.
It is completely understandable that the Deaf community desires to be brought out from under the purview of the ADA. For an individual to be called "disabled," but have no loss of cognitive capacity would be insulting. However, as far as ASL being recognized before Spanglish or Black English, ASL is not as foreign to English as some would have us believe. It may have a different grammatical structure than Standard American English, but when deaf individuals sign and mouth along with what they are signing, they are mouthing English words. Is this not the definition of Black English or Spanglish? When an individual speaks Spanglish, they are speaking English, but interjecting Spanish words and, occasionally, Spanish grammar (the SOV structure as opposed to SVO). Individuals who speak Black English are also using English words that often have American cultural significance, but are composed in a grammatical fashion that is akward to the Standard American English speaker.
My point is that the majority of the American population does not yet know how to comfortably interact/communicate with the Deaf. Deaf people are often viewed by hearing individuals as unintelligent or slow when, what most hearing people don't understand, deaf people are simply "speaking" a variation of Standard English.

My inability to understand...

It’s hard for me to grasp the particulars of the Deaf community. With Black English and Spanglish speakers I can see and understand oppression that has taken place for hundreds of years. I have never believed that being black or Spanish is a disability or a defect. Deafness is different. The words disability and defect are ugly in this situation. I do not mean to say that deafness is a bad thing; it is an extremely unfortunate problem for all those plagued with it. I truthfully can’t imagine that anyone would want to be deaf. If you are Black or Spanish, you can “overcome” adversity if you will by changing yourself in certain settings to fit more to the standard idea of what a person should be. If you are Deaf, you can’t change or shape yourself into something else.
This being said, I do believe that the problems that these groups have are similar. All of them are striving to be recognized as their own valuable entity in the world. Deaf people, however, are of a different breed altogether.

cutting ice at the corner garage

1. If someone wanted to challenge gender roles in our society through public discourse, what might be ways to go about it?

The short answer: Speak Up! If there are gender stereotypes that you do not personally conform to, don't accept them. This is the only way anyone accomplishes anything. Amelia Earhart didn't need a social constructionist theory of gender. She didn't even need feminism. She needed to fly.

As a Libertarian, I am opposed to grand schemes of restrucuring society. While I have no nostalgia for 50's-style prescriptive sex-roles and applaud the achievement of legal equality for women, I am dubious of the notion that all of our ideas about masculinity and femininity are socially constructed, and therefore that it would be desirous or even possible (through language, at least) to eliminate them.

In her masterful study of male and female as both physical reality and imaginative principle in Western art and culture, Sexual Personae, Camille Paglia writes: "Androgyny, which some feminists promote as a pacifist blueprint for sexual utopia, belongs to the contemplative rather than active life. It is the ancient perogative of priests, shamans, and artists. Feminists have politicized it as a weapon against the masculine principal. Redefined, it now means men must be like women and women can be whatever they want. . . . Prescriptions for the future by bourgeois academics and writers carry their own bias. The reform of a college English department cuts no ice down at the corner garage."

I heartily recommend this book. Where Paglia sees ideas rooted in physical reality, even as they strain to transcend it, current academic theory sees only an endless concatenation of words imposing disembodied power relations.

Deaf Language

ASL and other forms of language are considered their own languages, which gives them power over Spanglish and Ebonics. From personal experience I would say that Spanglish and Ebonics are more slang and reformed English than anything else. ASL is completely foreign to English.

I speak English. It's the only language I know. I couldn't communicate with someone who only understood ASL. If I was talking to someone who only spoke Spanglish or Ebonics, I'm pretty sure I'd understand what they were saying.

Read my lips...

In one of the readings, a Deaf woman said, "When our language was acknowledged, we gained our freedom." How does this differ from speakers of Spanglish or Black English Vernacular's efforts to have those languages recognized?

Frankly, I had a hard time coming up with arguments to explain how they differ, because I see much in common between their struggles for identity and recognition; just as language is power, language is freedom, the point which the deaf woman has already stated; however, it seems apt to describe freedom in more specific terms, as liberation. I know this is a theme I return to time and time again, but language is an integral, material part of resistance to oppression, and to becoming liberated.

However, without further pontification, I decided that the difference lies in the minutia - that is, without recognition of their forms of the communication, the deaf remain in bondage, meaningless without a method to communicate. Conversely, speakers of Spanglish or Black English may still convey meaning even if only within their own respective communities. And although recognition is important for B.A. and Spanglish speakers, they do not remain "meaningless" as the deaf do without it.

I'll have to think about this more, but those are my preliminary thoughts.

gender language can be complicated because of the "identity" confusion that many find themselves in, in today's society. Listening to the transgender speaking i knew it was a man, a very confused one to. Regardless of the fact that i don't agree with all that identity crisis they got through it is his life and i respect him/her for that. Our voices or our language is what identifies us. we can say so much through the tone of our voices, when we are happy or sad or mad. Man's voices are definitely deeper than women and that's very attractive. women's voices are more soft and higher pitch and you can tell with your eyes closed whether is a man or a women. there are definitely certain characteristic that define us as far as expressing our feelings and every day situations. Man have a firmer voice, authoritative there are certain professions where man's voice can have a more negative impact if they cannot control the level of their voices. hospitals are a good example i like when, whether is a male or female nurse or even a doctor, use a very soft almost baby like type of voice. The way one is brought up also has a big influence on how he/she expresses or behaves in certain situations, resulting in judgment on the part of relatives, friends regarding gender appropriate behavior.

November 1: Gender Language or Deaf Language

Hi Everyone,

Here are two questions for you to consider. You only need to respond to one by Sunday night. Then, you need to respond to two other posts by Tuesday's class.

1. If someone wanted to challenge gender roles in our society through public discourse, what might be ways to go about it?

2. In one of the readings, a Deaf woman said, "When our language was acknowledged, we gained our freedom." How does this differ from speakers of Spanglish or Black English Vernacular's efforts to have those languages recognized?

Thanks,
Tiffany