A Culture, Not a Handicap

Sunday, April 7, 1996

By GREGORY J. RUMMO

         MARTHA VERES of Clifton made the headlines last month when she became the first deaf person to sit as a juror in Superior Court in Paterson. Assistant Prosecutor Lisa Squitieri said she chose Veres because "she didn't stand out any differently."
    This is precisely what the deaf have been seeking for so many years -- the public recognition that they are not different from other people -- and that being deaf is not a handicap but simply another culture.
    The concept of "deaf culture" seems strange to those of us in the hearing world. Most hearing people tend to think of deafness as a handicap, lumping it together with such things as blindness and various forms of mental retardation. This is deeply offensive to the deaf, who simply view themselves as different and a part of a culture defined by its own unique language -- sign language.
   I posed the question, "What is deaf culture?" to several eighth graders at the Lake Drive School for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Children in Mountain Lakes. Our 5-year-old son, James, is profoundly deaf and attends Lake Drive School. Martha Veres' nephew, Bradley, is in James' class.
   The answers I got from the students were very interesting. Ernie Roszkowski wrote, "Deaf culture is the way [deaf] people live, including their beliefs, arts, customs, ideas, and inventions, [with] no difference between the deaf and hearing except the language each group uses."
    Christine Sullivan said, "Deaf culture has a special meaning to me. I think that deaf culture is a world just the same as other worlds, only in this world, no one can hear. The only thing that is different is we communicate differently. I like both worlds, there is no difference to me."
    Using a sign language interpreter, I spoke over the telephone to Sherry Bravin Duhon, the assistant director of public relations at Gallaudet University, the deaf school in Washington where students protested in 1988, closing the university until their demands for a deaf president were met. She explained to me, "Many hearing people think they need to help the deaf, as if we are handicapped. They don't need to help, they need to be willing to work together with the deaf to decide what's best for us. It is important that we build a bridge between the deaf and hearing cultures." Duhon's two hearing sons have helped her understand the hearing world while she has been able to teach them about deaf culture.
    Deaf culture was touched upon briefly in the movie "Mr. Holland's Opus." The movie stars Richard Dreyfus as Glenn Holland, a frustrated composer who takes a job as a music teacher in a public school. From the hearing world's perspective, Holland's frustrations increase when it is discovered that his son has been born with a 90 percent hearing loss.
    But think of it from the deaf son's perspective. Here is a boy who will never hear "normally," confronted with the challenge of being raised by two hearing parents, one of whom is totally consumed by something -- music -- that the boy can never fully appreciate.
    Lake Drive eighth grader Megan Gaffney provided some of the deepest insights into the meaning of deaf culture. She recounted meeting a hearing girl with a lot of freckles. The girl was captivated by Megan's deafness, and, curious to learn more about the deaf girl, tapped Megan's mother on the shoulder.
    "My mom said things to her about me," Megan wrote. "I caught my name in my mom's mouth. The girl kept nodding with a wide smile and her hair waved when she nodded. I sat impatiently and waited for them to finish talking. It took so long. . . ."
    Finally, Megan's mother turned to her and explained that the little girl with the freckles would be thrilled to learn sign language. "We became good friends after that," Megan wrote. "I taught her how to sign, and she taught me how to speak.
    "I looked at myself and realized that I should be proud of myself because of my culture. There is more than you would expect in the world of deaf culture. Deaf culture made me special and a different person. I like this and will hold on to it for my future."

You may e-mail the author at GregoryJRummo@aol.com