How the deaf community have been affected during the pandemic
The past year has had its challenges for all of us: the multiple lockdowns; restrictions and new laws put in place. It seems as though as soon as we face and conquer one problem another issue arises. But whilst this year has had a significant impact on all of our lives there are some people who have faced a substantially bigger challenge than others, obstacles that we don’t know of, understand or recognize. The issues that people who have disabilities and/or are deaf or hearing impaired are going through are hard to comprehend from an outside perspective and are often not brought to light: these people can be seen to feel like they have no voice or platform to explain and that the challenges which they constantly come up against are not important enough to be broadcast. During this last year deaf people have faced an all-round inaccessibility to many things we would consider a necessity due to the blatant disregard and ableism when the new restrictions and laws were published and put into place. This group of people have been overlooked time and time again as they are a minority and/or would require slightly more work and effort from those in charge to modify and adapt the standard practices.
Generally speaking, Deaf people will come across many more challenges during their lifetime, starting from the time they are born. This is due to a multitude of reasons: 90% of deaf children are born to hearing parents; these parents normally have no prior knowledge or understanding of how to communicate with and sign to deaf people, this leads to deaf children not developing at the same rate as other children as parents have to be taught a method of communication. Furthermore 40% of these deaf children have more specific needs as well as their hearing loss which affect their life both socially and their education. Despite there being over 11 million deaf and hearing impaired people living within the U.K. finding support for the families and children proves to be very hard; getting a diagnosis takes a long time in itself as hearing loss is sometimes hard to diagnose in very young children and it can hide under a mask of other disabilities. Finding help and the right services after diagnosis can be even more challenging and varies greatly from one end of the country to the other.
We, who have no disabilities underestimate the amount of changes those with disabilities have to make in their lives. For example, those who live in a household with someone hard of hearing have to change the inside of their house to make it accessible for everyone, such as telephones, televisions and alarms. These sounds are missing from the register of a deaf person, so a system of alert lights is fitted as a warning. As well as this, to ensure that a deaf child is developing at the same speed as anyone else, the parents and possibly other family members need to learn sign language so they can communicate, and they will also need to send the child to speech therapy and other learning supports. Everything that accommodates for a deaf person to have the same quality of life as anyone else takes time and money, and the services that are meant to help are far and between; this leads to deaf people not having the same opportunities or at times quality of life. All of the ways that a deaf person and their families are able to adapt will have been limited this past year. From the inaccessibility of BSL lessons and speech therapy to not being able to get the modifications for their houses fitted. Schools have also been closed, so deaf children haven’t been able to start their learning or establish a deaf peer group.
There has been much focus on children generally this past year; worry about how the pandemic may affect them mentally, socially and in their education. However just like in adults that have disabilities, deaf children are often overlooked and forgotten. Many think that deaf children cannot have a normal childhood anyway so have not been considered during this time. In the UK there are over 11 million people who are deaf or hard of hearing; out of this number there are 45,000 profoundly deaf children. Of these children, most rely on British sign language to communicate and it is their first language (it is often much later in life that they may begin to lip read). They may go to a specialised deaf school or attend a school with signing support or a hearing impairment department; but most certainly they will have and need deaf peers. During lockdown they will have had limited access to this as many deaf children do not communicate in BSL at home. Unlike their hearing peers who can utilise platforms such as zoom, using face time or Zoom as a deaf person is a lot harder. Signing is not as clear and lip patterns are hard to see and obviously going out in public creates a huge obstacle in this respect due to the mandatory use of masks. Play dates and meeting up with other deaf peers were harder as well due to many deaf children travelling greater distances to their school. This time has been especially worrying for deaf children as there is already a considerably large gap in achievement between deaf and hearing pupils in the school system, particularly in subjects like English. This is because BSL has its own grammar and structure; it is always much harder for a deaf person to sit down and read a book as their hearing peers could do during lockdown. This makes education more difficult to deliver when not in person.
For many in the deaf community they were left feeling isolated at the start of the initial lockdown. At first (unlike many other countries) the U.K government did not provide a BSL interpreter at its daily coronavirus news briefings. When they finally relented to represent the deaf community, instead of having an in-room interpreter who would have stood in the briefing room they elected to only have an in vision (box in the corner of the screen) interpreter on the BBC news channel. This meant that only people who watched this bulletin live were party to the BSL version. There is of course a facility for deaf people to display subtitles on their screen, but the subtitles are based on English grammar and therefore not in a deaf friendly /BSL structure. This leads to a deaf person having to process the information in their language and very often missing out the meaning of the piece.
Recently during a press conference Boris Johnson and other politicians came under fire. During a question and answer segment of a press conference MP Vicky Foxcroft asked her question to the prime minister in British sign language, she stated that if Boris Johnson couldn’t understand it, he was experiencing what life is like for the deaf community who rely on sign language every day. This poised statement highlighted the continued failure to support the deaf community. Downing street spent £2.6 million on a T.V. studio for press conferences, yet still provided no interpreter on their main briefing. There was a clear disregard and ignorance that has led to the further isolation and neglect of deaf people, it goes so far to demonstrate the ableism that is ingrained within our society. It is not fair that the access to information is restricted, be it purposeful or not, prohibiting those with disabilities from such important information.
In this past year we have relied on news more than ever before, there have been constant changes to our society that we have been notified on, yet this information is not being transcribed in the right ways for deaf people. It is incredibly ignorant and patronising to have deaf people rely on carers, communicators or subtitles to receive news. Many European countries such as Portugal have many broadcasts signed live. New systems should be put in places such as signers alongside news broadcasting so that everyone receives that same quality and quantity of information and news at the same time. Whilst there is an argument for the news being related later onto the social media platforms, it has its many limitations and consequences. The problem being that first of all the news will not have the same detail and width of information due to character restraints and/or the purposeful appeal of clickbait and trying to catch attention with the use of shortened snippets of information. Furthermore, on platforms such as Facebook you are at the mercy of someone’s interpretation of the news rather than getting the true facts, this can be very misleading particularly if this is someone’s first-hand knowledge of the news.
I interviewed sign language interpreter Jenny Davis to talk about why BSL is taught as a first language and the differences in grammatical format. Plus, some challenges that she believes the deaf community may have been faced with in this past year.
‘’In answer to your question, BSL is taught as a first language to profoundly deaf children as they can’t access any sound, so word formation is impossible. They are taught to attribute meaning to an object at first and later on when this is secure, we move on to introducing words e.g. picture of cat, sign for cat and then the word cat. The structure of BSL is very different to English grammar. In English we are taught Subject then verb then object but in BSL it is usually time frame then topic then action. Sort of like, in English it would be ‘I made a cake’ and in BSL it would be ‘Cake I made’. When you think about these grammatical anomalies is it any wonder that deaf people have trouble following subtitles that are in English?’’
I went on to ask Jenny, if due to the Covid crisis it had bought the need for sign language interpreters to the fore?
‘’It certainly has. It just makes me realise that we should be asking for BSL interpreters to be at every major news bulletin or urgent press conference. How can you expect such a large portion of society to receive news second hand?’’
I asked if there were any day to day changes that she could relate.
‘’Well, I would usually interpret for many deaf people at things like doctors’ appointments but all appointments have been via zoom or on the phone which has been a major problem. I also sometimes attend birthday parties with deaf children and obviously these haven’t been taking place’’
Following my conversation with jenny it becomes apparent that there are many challenges for the deaf community that we as hearing people take for granted. It demonstrates further how deaf people as well as those working in deaf focused industries have not been considered or supported during this past year and in the formation of new legislation.
Day to day life has been problematic for the hearing impaired due to multiple reasons, one of which being the suspension of medical services and their continuation via zoom or face time appointments. In ordinary times many deaf people will book an interpreter to attend a medical appointment with them or have a family member go with them. This service was obviously not readily available to them in lockdown. Moreover, regular appointments in audiology departments were cancelled so any maintenance or repair to hearing equipment was badly impacted. The impact on audiology department will have particularly effected new diagnosis of deafness and will have made the already long and hard process in getting a diagnosis and help much worse.
Matters such as daily shopping was also made abundantly harder with the wearing of facemasks preventing lip reading and people’s genuine self interest in their own safety and personal space further limiting the amount someone who is hard of hearing being able to understand. The recent production and usage of Perspex masks has eased the frustrations of deaf people as they have been able to read a lip pattern or even see an encouraging smile. However, these Perspex masks are not a requirement and are not often used. The wearing of masks has been one of the biggest challenges to those with hearing problems. It has meant that one of the main ways that deaf people are able to communicate has been taken away as so many rely on seeing the lip patterns of the speaker. Another social aspect of a deaf person could be something as simple as attending a deaf club every week. These clubs were obviously shutdown in lockdown and even when small groups were allowed to reform face masks still had to be worn.
When we consider issues such as mental health, comparing and contrasting between deaf and hearing people: there are much higher rates of mental health problems in deaf people. One of the factors contributing to this is the daily challenges they have within hearing society. Covid-19 is only creating more issues and additional challenges.
Obviously face masks are a requirement to protect our health, the health of others and to reduce the strain that covid-19 is placing on the healthcare system and its workers. However, the idea has been presented that the see-through Perspex masks and face shields be used more and even be a requirement within certain industries. In order to accomplish this, they need to be made available to education, hospitality and healthcare settings to allow for lip reading and avoid the further isolation of the deaf community within society.
Debbie Randall is a deaf lady who lives and works in a deaf school in High Wycombe. Her first language is British sign language and she relies on seeing someone’s lips to help her understand. I interviewed alongside her interpreter to ask how the lockdown has impacted on her day to day life.
“I have struggled in lockdown a lot. My workplace has many hearing-impaired people and I could go in on a Monday and have a nice chat about my weekend. I haven’t been able to go to my workplace for 6 months as it has been shut. I also attend a local deaf club which has been cancelled for over a year.’’
I asked her if platforms like Zoom or facetime have been helpful to which she replied.
‘’It is very hard to sign over a Zoom call as so often the reception can be bad, or the phone moves out of shot of the other persons hands and I can’t see what they are saying.’’
She went on further to explain that,
‘’I used to enjoy going to the supermarket to do my weekly shopping, but I have avoided it for many months as I rely so heavily on seeing lip patterns. Luckily for me some of the big supermarkets have a system in place called video relay. Which means I can make a shopping list then place a zoom call to an interpreter who will pass my shopping onto the store”
I questioned whether she was frustrated by the lack of a sign language interpreter on the daily news briefings.
‘‘At first, I was very confused and frustrated. I couldn’t understand what was going on and what I was allowed to do. Even though I have subtitles on my television it takes me a long time to interpret the words from English into British sign language in my head. There was no interpreter. I felt like I had been left out and it made me feel very anxious.’’
Debbie went on to tell me,
‘‘I like to go out with my deaf friends, and I couldn’t see them during lockdown. My husband signs a little bit, but it is not the same when you can’t have a fluent conversation.’’
I asked her if she thought her mental health had suffered this past year as a result from the drastic changes in her everyday schedule or through the new laws and restrictions which haven’t considered deaf people.
‘‘I feel a lot more anxious than I used to. I never used to feel nervous about going out in public, but I can’t see people’s faces and I can’t judge their emotions or mood.’’
Debbie is one of a growing number of people with a disability who have seen their mental health impacted.
Despite the numerous negative consequences that have impacted the deaf community during the pandemic there have been a few positives that have come through all this. Such as the rise of the newer platform TIKTOK, this platform has created a way for deaf people to not only find others like themselves but has given them a voice which has led to others listening. It is also a highly visual area of social media and at times requires no words at all to make an impact and has been great for the younger community.
Other innovations in the tech world are bringing huge changes in accessibility. Google have announced that its live video-chatting platform ‘Google meet’, would start to include live captioning which can transcribe a conversation almost instantly. As well as this, there is a new app around called Ava. It was developed by a hearing man who had grown up with deaf parents Ava offers live transcriptions of phone calls, conversations and video calls. This can obviously be used at work across platforms such as Microsoft. If these news apps and innovation become more mainstream through advertisement and if the deaf community continue to rise on social media platforms; it will help awareness of deaf issues, prevent ostracization and begin to resolve some of problems that the deaf community face such as isolation from the hearing members of society.