The lives of the Deaf and the Hard of Hearing; 2020

As I re- submerge myself into the Deaf and HOH (D/HOH) community for this story, more and more things come to my attention. There are so many things that are going on in the world right now, from the election coming up in less than a month to daily updates and changes to the status and effects of Covid-19. One of the things that are the freshest in my mind today is what access the D/HOH has to information on the presidential election, mainly the debates. As I watched both the presidential debate and the VP debate, it was hard enough to follow in English, I could not imagine interpreters trying to convey this into ASL. Watching the broadcast, there were no interpreters present. I thought this was interesting because even at state level city halls or announcements that are broadcast on public television, interpreters have been present recently. I began to look into ways that the presidential debate could be made accessible or what resources were available. It was actually not that long before I came upon one of the Facebook pages that I follow, Deaf inc. had a fully translated version of the debate.

As I continue to follow this story and look into this project, I hope to find similar resources. Even though this instance just happened by chance, this process is similar to how I plan to conduct my research from secondary sources. I also plan to use at least 5 primary resources for my story. I will have a list of questions to ask them about their experiences, struggles, and solutions they have endured this year. I plan to expand these, but my questions will include how much more difficult communication is since starting to wear masks, where (or in what situation ) communication has been the most hindered if they have ever run into people getting angry or rude with them because of the disconnect, and what measures and “hacks” have they taken or found that has allowed them to continue to conduct their daily lives. One of the other things that I want to ask the members of the community is how informed they feel about everything that is happening. Never before (at least for my generation) has there been something so widespread and important to keep informed daily on. I know that since I am a college student and don't pay for TV, my news sources tend to come from journals and reporting websites on Snapchat, or I will seek out reports and articles online. I want to know how readily available all this information is to the D/HOH community. I have a few connections that I know personally from past classes or group chats, but I would also love to interview some members of the community that I wouldn't have come across in my life so far, people from parts of the community that is different or farther removed from an education setting.