Chapter 1: Introduction
Who will be interested in this book?
This book focuses on the educational experiences of 25 DHH (deaf or hard of hearing) children in The Republic of Ireland. It will be relevant to anyone that is interested in the transition from segregated to mainstream education for DHH children. Readers in Ireland will be interested in this book, as there is a dearth of research within the context of DHH education in Ireland. Instead of focusing on academic or social outcomes, this book examines prevailing discourses around the medical and social models of d/Deafness, and how the mainstreaming movement has impacted on same. The historical context of deaf education contextualizes language use, and the emergence of medical and social models of d/Deafness. This book also critically analyses power relationships between parents, children and professionals, and how power and resistance has influenced deaf education and discourses of d/Deafness in Ireland. The companion website includes chapter summaries in Sign Language. These summaries are intended to complement your reading of the book, but do not serve as a replacement for the book.
Different ideas about what it means to be deaf:
Many DHH children demonstrate difficulties acquiring spoken language, print literacy, and accessing conventional education systems. As a result, there has been much debate about how best to communicate with and education DHH children. One on hand there is a manualist philosophy (where signing is the primary mode of education), and on the other hand an oralist philosophy (where spoken instruction is favoured) philosophy. These philosophies are linked to bigger debates about what it means to be deaf. The manualist philosophy is linked to a social model of deafness, recognising that Deaf people comprise a Deaf community, which shares a common language, sign language, with its own grammar and syntax, cultural norms, values, and history. On the one hand, the medical model of deafness views hearing impairment as a problem that should be rehabilitated. Often, this comes in the form of amplification (using hearing aids) or surgery (e.g., cochlear implantation). This rehabilitation is accompanied by intensive therapy to assist the development of listening and speaking skills. As such, the medical model is aligned with the oralist philosophy.
Until the 1970’s, schools for the deaf varied in their philosophical approach. Whatever approach was taken, these students benefited from interactions with DHH peers. They often learned sign language and Deaf culture and this was passed down from generation to generation in schools for the deaf. After the 1970’s, America, bolstered by the Civil Rights movement and several key pieces of legislation, saw nearly all DHH children become candidates for mainstream education. In Ireland, many DHH children had already begun attending their local mainstream school before the Education Act (1998) and the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act (ESPEN) (2004) legislated for this. Presently, approximately 78% of DHH children in Ireland attend mainstream schools. This caused a significant change in deaf education: DHH children were no longer being educated with their DHH peers. At this point, we see the medical model start to dominate deaf education.
Debates between medical and social models of d/Deafness has socio-economic and political implications. It reflects contrasting desires for a DHH child to be a member of the Deaf community versus being assimilated into hearing society.
Terms used in this book:
Language is laden with political and social meaning for DHH people, as such, the terminology used book was afforded careful consideration. The Deaf community is recognized by the capitalization of the word Deaf, while deaf signifies an audiological deficiency. The abbreviation DHH acknowledges the continuum of identification along which children are placed by others/by themselves and recognizes the distinct “Hard of Hearing” identity. Sign language refers to distinct languages with their own linguistic structure. As support for DHH students in Ireland is predominantly withdrawal based, the terms integration and mainstreaming are used synonymously instead of inclusion. Individual/full mainstreaming is when the student is the only, or one of a few, DHH student within their school. Group mainstreaming refers when DHH students in mainstream are grouped together in a class referred to as a unit.
About the research done for this book:
This book is based on a doctoral research project that responded to the lack of research into DHH education in Ireland. Open narrative interviews conducted between 2007 and 2008 tell the stories of 25 DHH children from the point of identification through early schooling. Two overarching questions guided the research:
If mainstreaming was about including all children, why is it that, in Ireland at least, DHH children who signed were not usually in mainstream schools?
What did mainstreaming mean for a social model of Deafness?
Twenty interviews were conducted with parents, twenty with education professionals (two of whom were Deaf), and eight with DHH children. Pseudonyms are used throughout the book. Participants were aged two to sixteen. Ten children attended a unit within in a mainstream school, eleven attended full mainstream, one attended a school for the deaf, one attended a school for children with general learning disabilities. Of the two pre-school aged children in this study, one proceeded to full mainstream, the other to a school for the deaf. Fifteen children had cochlear implants (CI’s), ten used hearing aids. Four children lived in homes where English was a second language, and four had an additional disability. Several participants were awaiting assessment for general learning disability.
This book examines how and why DHH children are mainstreamed. Chapters two and three provide background and context for this research. Chapter four examines the history of deaf education. Chapter five examines how the medical model came to prominence, while chapter six reflects on resistance towards the medical model. Chapter seven concludes and summarizes the book. It is important to note that this book is not a criticism of the medical professionals who work within the medical system, or an argument against the provision of opportunities to acquire speech and to be included in schools with their hearing peers. The concern, instead, is when the mainstreaming agenda occurs in tandem with negative discourse around Deafness, sign language, and the Deaf community.