Deaf Awareness Week is this week so I was asked to tell a little about my daily experiences here at ETSU. I’m an information technology major, new to ETSU and a deaf student.
I’m just like any student at ETSU. Whenever I’m on campus, I blend in feeling right at home when I’m typing away on my laptop in the Cave or working out on the treadmill at the CPA. Typical days usually start after a long night of studying binary numbers and the OSI model of networks. I’ll wake up early in the day so I can avoid the parking rush to find a parking spot easily then I’ll go to the Culp Center to get a coffee from Java City. I’ll go about my daily class routine and then grab some grub on my way home at the end of the day. I do all this effortlessly despite my deafness.
Based on my experiences over the years as I’ve grown up I’ve become a very independent person. I can order food from a restaurant by myself. I order drinks from bars without much difficulty. I am able to lip-read during conversations with hearing people. However I can’t lip-read everything that I see especially with the variety of people that I come across. Growing up I had speech therapy so that I was able to learn how to talk to the best of my ability. Being deaf, it isn’t easy for me to be able to talk because I’m unable to hear what I can say or even hear so that I can copy and learn how to say the words. Eighteen years of speech therapy has taken me a long way, however there’s room for improvement as always. There’s no substitute for experience in becoming independent. I couldn’t have done it if my family and teachers hadn’t forced me out into the world making me take care of myself so that I could do it without getting help from anyone.
I do require special accommodations in each of my classes. I use a sign language interpreter, sometimes two especially in lecture- intensive courses. I depend on volunteers to take notes for me. If I took notes and had an interpreter I’d be so lost trying to catch up with what was being discussed in my classes. So I focus on paying attention to my interpreter and having my notes handed to me after class from the volunteers. I am really grateful for those people.
These are some questions about my deafness that I usually get from random people as I go about my life. People think they’re infringing on something sacred by asking me these questions. But I really don’t mind answering questions about the Deaf culture and my experiences as a deaf person.
“Were you born deaf?” “How long have you been deaf?” “How did you become deaf?”
I was born deaf. The reason for my deafness is really unknown but if I had to guess I’d venture to think that it would be some nerve problems or some undeveloped parts in the ear. Some people’s deafness is caused from meningitis or German measles. I wasn’t sick as a baby though so it doesn’t explain the cause for my deafness.
“How did you learn sign language?” “How old were you when you learned sign language?”
I started going to a special daycare for deaf and “hearing impaired” children where the staff taught me sign language. I don’t remember how I learned but that’s what I’m told by my mom. I was 18 months old when I started going to the daycare. In families where both or one parent is deaf and the child is deaf learning sign language comes as naturally or even quicker than being taught spoken language.
“Did your family learn sign language?”
Yes, my parents upon finding out that I was deaf enrolled in some sign language classes. I believe they were SEE (signing exact English). That was the basis of the signs that I knew as I grew up into an ugly teenager. Awkward signs as I signed every single word in the English dictionary except for the words that I didn’t know and if I didn’t know the word I’d just fingerspell it.
“Did you have to go to a special school?”
Yes up to the sixth grade I was placed in a school where it was a half hour to an hour’s bus ride from my house depending on all the ‘special needs’ kids that were on the route. We’d go through so many towns that I wouldn’t get home for so long and it was absolutely exhausting and I hated those bus rides. Coming home with my mom or dad was more exciting than a freaking bus ride. Anyway the school had classes for deaf students my age at the time. The teachers of the deaf classes knew sign language.
You can find out more about my deaf experiences in my blog at louisdeaf.blogspot.com. I will also be answering more questions about my experiences during a presentation about what it’s like to be deaf for Deaf Awareness Week on Wednesday, Oct., 4 at 1 p.m. in Meeting Room 3 in the Culp Center.

Author