Installment 5

Ultimately, everyone wants to find a place where they belong in society, people with disabilities
included. Unfortunately, the majority of history concerning people with disabilities has been one
of exclusion and isolation. Most were either kept at home or sent to institutions because they
were seen as a burden not only on the family but on society as a whole. My disability history
begins in the 1980s.
During the 1980s and 1990s, there was a series of movements called the Disability
Rights Movement that focused on ending discrimination towards people with disabilities and
providing equal opportunities as well as access to schools and work places. Prior to this decade,
the majority of people with disabilities were excluded in society. The process of
institutionalization was still the mainstream means of caring for children with disabilities. This
meant sending the child to just thatan institution, which was usually a thinly disguised
hospital or sanitarium for crazy people. Since disability was thought of as a burden, the phrase
out of sight, out of mind became the mantra when it concerned persons with disabilities. These
places were often abusive to the people in their care.
Parents who didnt want to send their children to these places had to fight to get what
their children with special needs deserved. They were often the only family in a school with a
child with disabilities and had to search elsewhere for families in similar situations to create their
own community of support. The point being, neither schools, nor the workplace, were obligated
to provide accommodations for persons with disabilities. These people were not considered
people and could be turned away without a second glance. Throughout the 1960s and well
into the 1980s and 1990s, people with disabilities began demanding their rights to an equal
education, as well as proper accommodations in the workplace. In this era it became more

common for persons with disabilities to have a voice in society as well as being acknowledged as
people. These movements were finalized in the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which were passed as laws in 1990. I was
three years old at the time. What these movements and acts have done, is enabled all persons
with disabilities to be socially successful.
Social success, to me, is defined as being able to express oneself and communicate, make
and maintain relationships, set boundaries within those relationships, be sensitive to the needs of
others, and be able to respectfully disagree with others, and also to handle stressful situations. As
for the world itself, some people would say that social success is being abled, this obviously does
not fit with persons who have disabilities, and yet everyone deserves to have a place within
society regardless of their ability. First of all, what does it mean to be abled? This definition
stems from history as someone who is normal. In this case an abled person has full
command of their five senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch), as well as functions and
develops both mentally and physically at the same rate as his or her peers. Abled children hit the
developmental milestones when they are supposed to and go through the phases of life as theyre
supposed to. This definition, does not describe me, nor does it describe many others.
How, then, do persons with disabilities define social success? The Deaf Community
decided to create their own group of like people in order to succeed in a majority Hearing world.
Their world is full of people who all know sign language in one form or another and who all to
some extent grew up with or around Deafness. The community is close, many of its members
having attended schools for the Deaf as children. Social success to the Deaf, then, is having a
sense of community. Likewise, hearing people share a sense of community through music, radio,
film, and social media.

But what if you are hard of hearing? You are not completely d/Deaf, nor are you
completely hearing. In which group would you fit? The answer in neither, at least, not
completely; having a hearing loss makes you invisible (to an extent). You do not use sign
language, but you dont catch all of the conversation either. I am hard of hearing. Some of the
things I share with the hearing world are listening to music and the radio, and some of the things
I share with the Deaf world are ASL and closed captioning on films and television. People are
often surprised to learn that I have a hearing loss, largely because I dont sound like a Deaf
person when I speak, this is because I started losing my hearing around the age of four, after I
had acquired language. I did not get my first pair of hearing aids until first grade. There will
always be situations where I cannot hear best; they are usually situations and events that attract a
lot of people, like music concerts, restaurants, sporting events, and amusement parks. While
hearing aids do amplify sounds, they do not make specific sounds clearer. It is harder for me as a
person with a hearing loss to tune out background noise, like chatter from a food court or
cafeteria. While newer models of hearing aids have the technology to do this today, they did not
ten years ago (to me at least).
How does someone with a hearing loss get by in a crowded, loud, keep-up-with-the-pace world?
It is in no way easy. For example, there are a number of ways that I will need to advocate for
myself in order to be successful as a person with a hearing loss. The first is no bluffing; bluffing
in this case means acting like I do understand what someone has said when I really didnt, this
often happens with jokes in not hearing the punch line correctly. I will have to advocate for
myself by asking others to rephrase what they have said, which will take patience; this act is
frustrating more often than not, but is necessary. The most important advocating I can do for
myself is not using my disability as a crutch.