I really appreciated the opportunity to meet with Vicki Bruno.  I took an ASL course a couple of semesters ago and while I don't remember too many of the signs I learned that semester, I do remember a lot about Deaf culture.  Vickie Bruno's impressive wealth of knowledge refreshed my memory about some of the more interesting aspects of the subject.

 

I think the point that was made about cochlear implants provides a lot of insight about how perspectives on "disabilities" can vary.   We, as hearing peope, ask ourselves how any Deaf person could want to continue life in silence and then we come up with a solution for them.  And while we sit back and think about how great it is that some Deaf people can be just like us, these people are watching their culture become a thing of the past. 

 

This situation comes to be because many hearing people fail to see deafness from the perspective of the Deaf.  I think that this habit we have of wanting to fix what we call shortcomings or disabilities in those that are different than we are negatively influences the way we perseve others.  It seems like we want to make everyone just like we are, for if we are all the same we will all be happy right?

 

The last part of class on May first was quite informational.  I've never considered what kind of damage can be done simply by focusing on negative statistics.  The way some anti campaigns focus on all of the bad things that happen when a small percent of the population does something irresponsible seems to be pretty irresponsible itself.  I whole-heartedly agree with the idea that a positive campaign that focuses on those individuals who are obeying the law and behaving responsibly is much more valuable than its counterpart.