Deaf Crit

The Deaf social movement was propelled in the late 1960s by earlier movements of such minority groups as African Americans and women. During its early stages, the Deaf movement patterned itself after other minority groups, and Deaf people were identified as belonging to a distinct minority group. However, the Deaf social movement, with no formal knowledge of ASL or Deaf culture, blended [Page 159]with other minority groups. The proponents of the Deaf movement primarily worked to reduce society’s discrimination against Deaf people parallel to when Black people demanded civil rights stemming from oppression by the dominant society.

In the 1970s, Deaf people realized that they had a legitimate language separate from the dominant language of hearing people. In the 1980s, Deaf people recognized their own particular culture. After looking at Latinos’ bilingual/bicultural movement, these “language and culture” factors prompted the Deaf community to shift its central self-perception to a unique linguistic and cultural group. As a result, it became increasingly self-determined and strove to gain more power in American society, but the struggle between the Deaf community and the dominant society continues today.

A greater awareness of society’s oppressive behaviors toward minority groups has flourished with the use of “isms.” People of color have racism; women have feminism; older people have ageism. Deaf people have audism, or hearing people’s pathological treatment of Deaf people. Deaf people have often used cultural reportage as a strategy to assert their unique position in American society. In response, the dominant society enacted legislative measures to reduce discrimination toward deaf people with the goal of full participation in the dominant structure. Through the mechanism of “assimilation” into hearing society, some Deaf people encountered tensions between cultural and pathological stances. They oftentimes were at a loss to explain in detail the internal dynamics of such a tension. The Black movement utilizes the Critical Race Theory (CRT) to better understand its position in a given situation. CRT not only provides awareness to a people, but also instills a sense of identity and pride in the group. CRT enables them to have deeper analyses of why their perceptions and interpretations of the same matter differ from the majority. To go past the level of cultural reportage, CRT offers the Deaf community an excellent framework.

CRT adopts a stance that challenges a dominant group when the structural and cultural aspects present a dilemma for minority groups wishing to fully participate in the public sphere, to defuse the dominant group’s linguistic/cultural snobbery, and to respect non-dominant discourses. According to Solorzano, CRT comes into existence from what is often termed critical theory and originates in the legal system. He quotes Mari Matsuda’s definition of CRT: “ . . . the work of progressive legal scholars of color who are attempting to develop a jurisprudence that accounts for the role of racism in American law and that work toward the elimination of racism as part of a larger goal of eliminating all forms of subordination.” Solorzano cogently states, “Critical race theory challenges the dominant discourse on race and racism as it relates to the law by examining how legal doctrine is used to subordinate certain racial and ethnic groups.” The growing awareness through CRT of the subordinated positions has produced an understanding as to why the “differences” must be respected and that they have nothing to do with the notion of superiority over inferiority. For example, the Deaf movement has pushed for the recognition and legitimization of ASL, stating that ASL is neither superior nor inferior to English.

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