Let's Talk About D/deaf Awareness Week

Annually in May, Deaf Awareness Week is celebrated. In this 'Let's Talk About Disability' instalment we are talking about D/deaf awareness and the support that is available at Warwick.

Not familiar with this instalment's theme? Find out more by clicking below:

What is the difference between deaf and Deaf?

Eleanor Hassall, Deaf student and former Warwick Enable President said:

"You might see deaf written as Deaf or D/deaf. The capitalisation of Deaf is often used by people who see their deafness as more than just a disability but also their cultural identity. The Deaf community is an especially strong one with its own cultural norms and rules, and obviously also our own language in British Sign Language! Some people might prefer to just say deaf instead of Deaf if they don’t feel very connected to the Deaf community or see their deafness as a disability rather than an identity."

You can read more of Elanor's reflections on language at the bottom of this page.

Stories from our community

Learn more by reading this reflection on the importance of language provided by a student below:

"Often when hearing people hear the word ‘deaf’ they assume we are referring to someone with absolutely no hearing at all. However, this is incorrect. Within the community, we use ‘deaf’ to refer to someone with any level of hearing loss at all, from mild all the way to profound (more on what those words mean in the FAQs above).

Within the Deaf community, there’s a whole host of language used and how people refer to themselves ultimately comes down to personal preference, however, here’s a quick guide to some expressions you might see used, and which ones to generally avoid.

You might also see deaf written as Deaf or D/deaf. The capitalisation of Deaf is often used by people who see their deafness as more than just a disability but also their cultural identity. The Deaf community is an especially strong one with its own cultural norms and rules, and obviously also our own language in British Sign Language! Some people might prefer to just say deaf instead of Deaf if they don’t feel very connected to the Deaf community or see their deafness as a disability rather than an identity.

You might also see people referring to themselves as ‘hard of hearing’ (often abbreviated to HoH). There is no rule as to what constitutes ‘deaf’ and what constitutes ‘HoH’ – it just comes down to how the individual prefers to view themselves.

However, one phrase to avoid at all costs as it is seen as highly offensive by the entire D/deaf/HoH community is ‘hearing impaired’. This is because this term implies that there is something wrong with us and that we need fixing. There’s a really good article on the use of 'hearing impaired' here if you’d like to read more."

Eleanor Hassall, Deaf student and former Warwick Enable President

And the personal story of a staff member below:

"Hearing Aids should be the answer. The problem is mine don’t always work, and getting them repaired is always a faff. Then there’s the problem with masks. Put the aid over the mask loop, and you worry about losing the aid. Put the mask over the aid, and you worry about damaging them.

I never knew how much I lip read. Add in how much masks muffle voices, and it’s all a very real problem. Voices are muffled at the best of times. I know you’re speaking, but for the life of me, I haven’t got a clue what you’re saying.

People have lived in bubbles with relatives these past few months. Without help, people with hearing difficulties live in a bubble of one their entire lives. When you can’t hear, people stop talking to you. You can’t hear birds sing, or the wind in the trees. The world is very boring when you can’t hear it properly. Worse, you’re isolated.

But hearing difficulty does not need to lead to a deaf sentence. Colleagues are universally very good. They understand the importance of clarity over volume. They readily spell out words when I ask them to do so. Vitally, they are patient. For that, a big thumbs up, and a huge 'thank you'."

Anonymous staff member

Top tips

The UK Council on Deafness have provided a list of top tips to support communication as part of D/deaf Awareness Week:

Face the person while you are speaking. Don’t turn away.
Repeat yourself if necessary.
Never say ‘It doesn’t matter’. If the person doesn’t understand you, don’t give up!
Write it down or draw a picture.
Speak one at a time, don’t talk over each other.
Keep your mouth visible. Smile and relax.
Don’t speak too quickly or too slowly.

Digital accessibility

The Library have brought together some of the freely available software and apps available to staff and students at Warwick which can support anyone who is D/deaf or hard of hearing.

IT services provide a wide range of guidance for digital accessibility for online teaching materials. Transcripts, subtitles and captions are paramount for video resources. Find out more about why it is important to make accessible video content, captions and audio descriptions, and how this applies to SiteBuilder video and audio clips.

Hearing loops

There is a dedicated webpage for portable hearing loops with a list of locations as well as links to instructions. These portable hearing loops are designed to work for 1:1 or very small group conversations to help hearing aid users minimise background noise. Centrally Timetabled Teaching Rooms have larger fixed loop systems more suitable for larger group or teaching activities. Rooms with fixed loop systems fitted can be found using the Centrally Timetabled Room Information Facilities Search, which allows you to filter rooms by Induction Loop and other features before booking the room. This website also contains details of how to report faults with both portable and fixed loop systems. The downloadable instructions associated with each loop on the webpage also includes instructions on positioning for portable systems. Across campus, to indicate loop systems, where appropriate we use the World Federation of the Deaf sign to indicate facilities for Deaf people, with the letter T indicating equipment to enhance microphone sound is set up for people whose hearing aid is fitted with a “T” switch.

If you know of a portable hearing loop that is not on the list, please get in touch with the Estates Accessibility team.

Face coverings

Although the Government has recently changed its guidance to say that a visor on its own does not constitute a face covering, as a University, we recognise our obligations to be proactive to anticipate the needs of disabled people under the Equality Act. As such, we will continue to issue and allow the use of visors on their own for service provision activities in combination with existing additional measures that we have in place on campus, such as social distancing, asymptomatic testing and transparent barriers as specified in local risk assessments. Examples of relevant service provision activities include teaching, customer service, and direct communication with people who rely on lip reading or the interpretation of facial expressions.

A polite reminder that not all disabilities are visible and some people may be exempt from wearing a face covering either due to their disability or to aid communication with a disabled person.

FAQs

We compiled a list of your frequently asked questions, which have been answered by a former Warwick Enable President, Eleanor Hassall.

What do different levels of deafness mean?

Deafness is broken down into 4 levels by audiologists: mild, moderate, severe, profound. I’ve included a picture below that puts these levels into context using an audiogram. On the X axis is sound frequency (low to high left to right) and on the Y axis is sound volume, increasing as it goes down. There are pictures of common sounds to show what these levels of deafness mean. So for example, I personally have mild deafness in my left ear and profound in my right. A firework or aeroplane could go off in my right ear and I literally wouldn’t hear it. But in my left, it’s just sounds like talking and doorbells I can’t hear.

How can I make my classes more accessible?

The main thing I can suggest is to ask the student as everyone will have personal preferences as to what works best for them. However, some general suggestions are:

If you are using any audio-visual content such as videos, podcasts, webinars etc. these must have captions or transcriptions, and if they don’t, you need to be prepared to provide one for your students. Please try to avoid things like saying ‘oh it doesn’t matter’ or ‘you don’t really need to watch this anyway’ as this is incredibly demoralising and isolating.
Send us PowerPoints, handouts, lesson plans, etc. in advance (this means more than 10 minutes before the start of a class!). If we can see these in advance, not only will it help with the phonetic issues mentioned above, but also if we know what sort of things to expect/listen out for, it makes lipreading and following a lot easier.
If you’re teaching a long class (over an hour) please consider including a short break as concentration fatigueLink opens in a new windowLink opens in a new window is a serious issue for us! I can’t go more than about 50 minutes before listening and following becomes so exhausting my brain gives up.
If someone has a BSL interpreter or a notetaker in the class, speak to the student not the person providing their communication support.

For online classes:

Ask people to turn their cameras on when they speak if possible. The subtle change in language from ‘turn cameras on’ to ‘only when speaking’ massively increased the number of people who turned their cameras on when contributing as they didn’t feel pressured to have them on all the time. This is hugely helpful as it allows for lip reading.
Try not to speak too fast – this also goes for recording lectures. The faster you speak, the harder it is for the auto-captions to pick you up and the less accurate they become – and trust me, they’re already pretty bad.
If people won’t turn their cameras on to speak, ask them to post a summary of their point in the chat and/or as the class tutor, summarise what they said with your camera on.

For in-person classes:

Lay tables out in a horse-shoe shape. This is because it means we can see the maximum number of people for lip reading.
Repeat questions from the floor, as it were, back to the rest of the room so that we’re clear on the questions that are being asked and can follow the discussion.
Don’t talk with your back turned (e.g., when you’re writing on a board) I can’t ‘hear’ you if I can’t see your lips.

Do hearing aids/cochlear implants ‘fix’ deafness?

Not even close! Hearing aids do not restore hearing, nor do they give the same access to sound as a hearing person. They simply amplify the noise and cannot distinguish between sounds or prioritise, for example, someone’s speech over traffic. This means they’re pretty useless where there is background noise or more than one person talking as when there are multiple sounds, all you can hear is one big indistinguishable wall of sound. Personally, for this reason, I often end up having to take my hearing aids out in seminars, especially during group work, and just rely on my lip-reading skills.

What’s a radio aid and why am I being asked to wear one?

A radio aid works a bit like a personal microphone for deaf students. The part you will be given is the transmitter containing a microphone which will pick up your voice and wirelessly transmit it into the receiver which is typically either built into the student’s cochlear implant/hearing aid or is worn as a loop around their neck. The sound feeds straight into the hearing aid and significantly reduces background noise, making it a lot easier for the student to follow classes.

If you are being asked to use a radio aid, please bear in mind they are incredibly powerful devices so shouting, eating, even drinking will all be amplified significantly into the student’s hearing aid! Also please remember to take the radio aid off if you need to leave the room or speak to someone in private.

Why do D/deaf students get extra time in exams/for essays?

At the risk of generalising, which I am very keen to avoid doing as Deafness is such a unique and individual experience, many Deaf students had language acquisition problems when growing up due to inability to access sounds. This means reading takes us longer as we struggle with piecing together sounds and phonetics as we can’t naturally ‘hear’ them in our head. We also often have exams in a room on our own for this reason too – so we can say things aloud to sound them out to try and figure it out. Reading and understanding things takes us a lot longer so the extra time mitigates this.

We would also declare our Deafness when submitting essays/exams/coursework as, especially for native BSL users (where they grew up with BSL as their first language instead of English), we might write sentences in a weird order as BSL has its own sentence structures, grammar rules, word orders etc. meaning that we might write in this manner rather than standard English. There are also some things in BSL that might not directly translate into English meaning we use weird word choices/phrasing that a hearing person wouldn’t. We declare our deafness so this can be considered when marking.

How can I make communication easier for a D/deaf person?

It will come as no surprise that the COVID-19 pandemic has made communication 100x harder for Deaf people! So many of us rely on lipreading and the arrival of masks has taken this away removing our main form of communication! So, what tips can I give?:

Be patient! If we don’t hear you first time, please don’t say ‘it doesn’t matter’ or ‘I’ll tell you later’. And if we ask you to repeat yourself, please say the same thing again as we’ll be trying to piece together what you’ve said and just need to hear it again.
Don’t just shout louder behind your mask as this won’t make it any easier for us to hear you. Alternatives include: write it in the notes section of your phone, use a pen and paper, gesture, get a mask with a clear panel to allow for lip reading, learn some basic BSL (more on how below), or as a last resort step back to be 2m away and lower your mask so we can lip read.
Make sure you have our attention before speaking to us e.g. large visual gesture or gently tapping us on the shoulder (some Deaf people don’t like the latter option though so always check).
Once you do have our attention, make sure you’re facing us when you speak and where possible try and have conversations with us in places with minimal back ground noise/distractions.
Speak clearly and naturally – please don’t shout or try and over exaggerate your lip patterns as this actually makes it harder to follow.

Where can I learn some basic BSL?

The most important thing is that you learn from someone who is qualified to teach and not just a random person off YouTube! There are so many people who have a level 1 or level 2 (level 2 is only GCSE standard) who post ‘educational’ videos online and these do more harm than good! I can really recommend the Doncaster Deaf Trust who have put their entire BSL Level 1 course online for everyone for freeLink opens in a new window! All you have to do is register for an account.

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