I just wanted to share that this week is deaf awareness week. The RNID have launched a mega campaign called “ it does matter”. Something many many deaf people get told all when they haven’t quite heard or understood something someone is saying. From personal experience this can be socially, with family, at work, in shops, restaurants or just in day to day life. I wanted to share it here because as a deaf person myself being told “ oh it doesn’t matter” when you don’t hear something first time is rude, dismissive and very very frustrating!

Anyway their amazing campaign is here and if you get a spare 5 minutes please take a look!

Thanks!

by Crazycatladyanddave

12 comments

  2. Does that mean there will be noise or there won’t be noise?

  4. Thanks for the link. I’ve signed up for the tips and advice on communicating with deaf people and including them more.

    I used to work with a profoundly deaf colleague and saw how he was often excluded from things. Although I couldn’t sign, we used gestures and facial expressions a lot, and I would try to face him and speak clearly without covering my mouth to help him lip-read. We used to have longer conversations by writing stuff down on a pad. We ended up getting on really well.

    Sorry about the “jokes” in other comments. The site you linked to even mentions the number of times hearing people dismiss those with hearing loss with those kind of remarks!

    Take care, and I hope the campaign makes a difference.

  8. I started learning sign language recently because I encountered a deaf customer who asked at me to look at her when speaking, and then I automatically started doing the whole enunciation thing and talking slowly before I realised hang on, this is not how people speak and not what she’s looking for, ended up having a completely normal conversation in the end but I felt bad because of how off guard she caught me, and figured I needed to educate myself. There’s lots of free apps which explain the basics, including how the language differs to typical spoken language which again I had no idea was a part of signing. It’s definitely worth doing, I know not every deaf person signs but it would be nice to be able to offer it as an option in future to my customers who may use it.

  9. Thanks for sharing! I am moderately deaf and rely on lip reading and hearing aids in some situations. It can be very isolating, especially when someone knows you are hard of hearing but continues to speak quietly/not look at you while speaking, or try to have a conversation when the tv is on despite you saying that makes your hearing aids completely ineffective. After asking a few times, I tend to not want to ask again and just accept I won’t be able to hear the conversation. Then people think I’m anti-social because I’m looking at my phone because I can’t participate in conversation lol. 

    A reminder that if you use hearing aids, you are eligible for a disabled persons railcard, which gets you a third of train tickets for you and 1 person travelling with you. 

  10. Thanks for this!

    I’ve had hearing aids for two and a half years and did a brief BSL introduction course at the back end of last year (with a proper one to start soon). I’ve found I struggle the most when there’s background noise, my office can be quite bad for this in that I sometimes can’t have a conversation with someone a couple of metres away. And I struggled last time I went to the cinema with rustling popcorn and sweets during dialogue heavy scenes.

  11. Here’s a non-obvious but fantastically effective tip: If someone doesn’t understand what is said the first time, rephrase the sentence!

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