Faces Behind the Screen

“I was born with albinism, which is what caused my visual impairment. I grew up having to learn how to navigate the world with low vision, while also being aware that my skin color was different from the rest of my biological family.

Growing up in an indigenous community was hard. Not only was my low vision a challenge, but it was also hard to accept my skin color. Being taught about the history of Indigenous communities with white Europeans, made me struggle with accepting the color of my own skin.”

What would you like tech companies to keep in mind?

“Probably the only thing I would like them to know is, if the deaf community is important to them, continue to be active and involved with the deaf community.”

“I’m really lucky and happy to be able to meet the people within the hearing loss community. They are all from different kinds of backgrounds and varying degrees of hearing loss, some people have come to terms with their hearing loss. Some people haven’t. Some people try to hide it. Some people are very expressive with it.”

“I’m not so much trying to bring in more interpreters, but trying to improve the quality of music. The whole idea started from me watching interpreters. I was like, OK, I’m deaf, and I’m learning sign language… why can’t I understand the interpreter?”

“Not knowing that she had hearing loss before three, I felt guilty because I work in early intervention. I didn’t even notice it. So I was feeling guilty for a long time. We made up for the years that we lost.”

“I was born and raised in a more oral method of instruction for the deaf where they teach you to speak and understand lip-reading. My father didn’t actually permit me to sign. And that was the 1970s or so. My mom did sign a little bit, mainly just home signs (invented gestures), but my father required me to speak when he was around.”

“When my hearing changed so dramatically, I wondered how I would be able to continue working… I couldn’t see a path forward with how I would function in my personal life and my work life. For me, getting a cochlear implant gave me my life back.”

“Deaf dogs are known for being more frightened because of the way that people treat them. It has nothing to do with them.”

“I remember playing telephone and noticing that I had to completely turn so they’d talk in my good ear.”

“Love yourself. It’s hard to do. But worth it.”

What is the best thing about being deaf?

“I hear screaming/crying babies less. Unfortunately, sometimes, I can still hear them depending on how close they are, but for the most part, the sound is less for me than it would be a hearing person. Sorry, babies. I understand why you cry, but it hurts.”

“My parents are both deaf, and ASL was my first language. English is actually a second language for me.

In our family we had a footstool that would sit by the TV, and that was the interpreter’s footstool because we didn’t have closed captioning back then. Growing up there was the Vietnam War, and that [was] the first war that was really televised. So I would sit on the footstool next to the TV and interpret the news and update Mom and Dad.”