Before I started learning BSL, I didn’t know any people who were Deaf.
I am hearing. I did not come from a Deaf family, I didn’t have friends or co-workers who were Deaf. There were no Deaf people in my life, I know what you may be thinking: why did I learn sign? The short answer is this: to communicate with Deaf people.
The long answer is a little more complex: I have always wanted to learn BSL, if it was an option for me in school I would have taken it.
I remember seeing people signing and thinking “I wish I could communicate with you in your language” and that’s when it started: The shame.
The shame that there was no provision for the hearing community to grow up with the idea of this form of communication as a desirable and accessible language. Growing up I learned snippets of Italian, French and German, but there never was an offer or suggestion of learning BSL at school.
That realisation for me is a shame on the hearing community. A few years ago, several things happened at the same time: I was very unhappy with my life, I had to reduce my working hours and I needed to do something positive and I decided it was time to start on one of my life long goals, learning BSL.
I quickly became entranced, not just with BSL as a language, but with the fact that I could for the first time ever communicate with the BSL users in the Deaf community in their language (even if I still make mistakes a lot of the time).
I quickly made lots of friends in the Deaf community as well as with other hearing learners and interpreters. The friendships I have made through learning BSL are markedly different from those with my hearing friends.
I like to get a lot of practice and will often sign with other hearing learner and interpreter friends. I was signing once with a hearing friend about how I felt sign affected our friendship, how it made it better, stronger, because I felt like we shared something, the language bonded us. And then it hit me again: The shame.
The shame of feeling that I was appropriating the language of a strong, proud community for my own gain, but at the same time wanting to practice in order to benefit my use of the language with Deaf people.
I asked one of my Deaf friends how they felt about BSL learners using BSL with other hearing people and they said “If signing with other hearing people helps you practice your skills and improves your communication with Deaf people, that’s fantastic, but don’t forget why you are learning it.” these words have stayed with me.
BSL has influenced and impacted on my life dramatically. It has given me positivity in myself, helped me to make a lot of new friends and I hope it will go on doing so, but I also feel it has had a negative impact on my relationship with the hearing community.
Hearing friends ask me to perform certain words or phrases in BSL and it makes me uncomfortable, I will not enable parroting of this language without an understanding of the deaf community, I encourage people to learn properly, from a deaf teacher.
I find myself wishing more of my hearing friends could sign, so I could sign more and they could increase their own deaf awareness. I read the articles on how deaf people are treated by hearing people and sadly I see it in real life too: people shouting when they find out someone is deaf, only acknowledging the interpreter, making assumptions based on perceived notions on deafness and hearing.
And it boils up inside me: THE SHAME. The shame of hearing privilege and the fact that most hearing people do not realise it exists.
The ‘inspiration porn’ that happens when a story about a deaf person or sign language hits the mainstream, without the people watching having any understanding of the deaf experience.
The shame I feel for being part of a hearing community where people are encouraged to learn foreign tongues and yet are not encouraged to communicate with the deaf people around us.
This is not new to me though, I live with an invisible, sometimes disabling chronic condition and am constantly met with the attitudes and assumptions of others. I work with people who have other physical disabilities and we talk about how the non-disabled community only seems to be interested when they can see us as inspiring.
What is the point in telling you about my hearing shame? To let you know that it is there. Just as I am aware of my hearing privilege, I want you to be aware of my hearing shame as someone whose only link to the Deaf community is a desire to communicate.
I love learning sign language and being able to communicate with Deaf BSL users in their language, but being a hearing person trying communicate in the Deaf world, there is shame clinging onto that love.
Both my shame and my love drive me to talk about sign with as many people as possible, to encourage hearing people to learn more about Deaf awareness and sign, to meet more Deaf people as possible and let them know I am happy and privileged just to be able to communicate with them.
Alice is a BSL learner who is also hearing. She lives in Bristol and works as an Independent Living Co-ordinator for Action for Blind People. Alice has a background in employment support with people who are Blind and Partially Sighted. She likes sewing and walking dogs.
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deanwales
July 20, 2015
Alice! Wow! Thanks for writing this entry. As well as perfectly reflecting my own sentiments – I too am a hearing BSL student – it is yet another important piece of writing published by Limping Chicken which urgently needs disseminating the wider UK populous. You have made me also feel the privilege, pride and shame. Thanks again.
Cathy
July 20, 2015
Oh dear!! Why does a hearing person have to feel shame about a language that isn’t theirs?
I am profoundly deaf and have been since an infant, but I do not understand why a hearing person would say it is desirable to learn sign language. How can a language that is predominantly used with no voice be desirable to hearing people who use their voice? I have never expected such desire to be there!
I have a hearing friend who I taught to finger spell. She has not learnt more as we speak. I do not want her to feel ashamed that she cannot use sign language to the full. We get by between us.
It would be fantastic if more hearing people signed but you do not need to feel shame. How could you have learnt it when there were no teachers of BSL years ago? And Deaf schòols were for deaf children only? The simple fact is you wouldn’t, so being ashamed is pointless!
Even today, when sign language is being taught to hearies; the numbers are still low. I find there are a few reasons for this: no interest in sign language (I’m not interested in learning Russian either); no time for courses (I’m busy too); no money for courses (I’m skint too)! I have no shame in not learning another language and neither should hearies.
Last, but not least, deaf children now have cochlear implants; very few have hearing aids. This is a fundamental change and means many are speaking better than past generations. Naturally, this means they are signing less not more, so you dont need the shame.
To this degree this situation also means that all you hearies will need to learn SSE not BSL!!
Now there’s a twist!! Perhaps you could transfer your shame to not learning SSE?!
Toni
July 20, 2015
Cathy – really great to hear your perspective. I am an Australian hearie who signs (Auslan) and do not feel shame at all. I work with deaf children and their families both oral and signing and enjoy socializing with deaf friends. I am disappointed that there is not more opportunity for parents and children to learn as many parents want to be able to expose their oral children to some signing, but shame has never entered my head.
Bobbins
September 24, 2015
Couldn’t agree more! I was a little embarrassed reading this.
heathermole
July 20, 2015
Alice, thank you for your thoughtful piece, you articulate something many people feel. BUT, I wonder whether the shame needs to be turned into something positive and practical. I have felt shame (in relation to my white privilege, my able-bodied privilege, my hearing privilege) but it left me in a paralysed place. Someone said to me, don’t stay in that place of shame because it doesn’t help anyone.
What you have done though, which seems positive, is ask your Deaf friends how they feel about your use of BSL. That seems important because it shows you care and that you’re aware of your privilege. Respecting and honouring Deaf people and their language and culture seems to be something you want to do.
Privilege, I think, is only something we can make ourselves aware of and try to remain aware of. We have to own up to it. That honesty and integrity has to guide our relationships with everyone we meet.
I wonder whether these thoughts are of any interest. The topic of hearing privilege is fascinating and deserves more engagement. I am hearing, anyone out there who is Deaf who wants to share more about your thoughts?
Carrie1970
July 21, 2015
I am HoH so I live in that middle world between hearing & deaf. Cathy, I originally became interested in sign language in elementary school around the of 9-10 (I’m from the US so it’s ASL instead of BSL) because I found it to be a beautiful language to watch, an art form in & of itself. Now that I’m slowly losing my hearing knowing some ASL has helped me in a lot of ways. I am nowhere near the fluency that I want to have but teach myself more when I have the extra time. I substitute teach & will introduce myself by name & that I’m HoH. I teach the students a bit of ASL because I have found it easier to use the ASL sign for “wait” to get the students attention (& in a more respectful way) than those teachers who try to yell over a noisy class. The students become more visually aware when I’m in their room. Introducing my classroom of the day to my hearing loss & ASL opens the door to a positive experience with the Deaf Community, a community that sometimes excludes me because I have partial hearing.
I agree that learning sign language should be offered as readily as Spanish, French, German, etc. in schools. I have had students from previous classrooms see me in the hallway & fingerspell “H-I” to me or sign “How are you” in ASL. They want to show me they remember & occasionally a few show me some ASL they looked up online (several times signs I didn’t know yet). I never feel shame because I am opening up a new pathway to a form of communication that many of these children have never been exposed to; & as I said, some of them have taught me new signs too…which is so cool!! I don’t feel shame that I don’t know as much as I would like to know because the Deaf people I have signed with have all told me that they appreciate my attempting to speak to them in their language & are so forgiving of my various & vast amount of mistakes. My fingers & hands may never master the artful dance of ASL but I still like to try to get them to sway with as much grace as I can manage.
Emily
July 30, 2015
It’s like you’re reading my mind!! 🙂 From a kindred hearing soul in America…..