Social Inclusiveness

In keeping with their policy towards disability as a whole, the Hong Kong government advocate inclusiveness or “integration” for the Deaf community, encouraging them to conform to mainstream society as much as possible and therefore not to mark themselves as socially distinct due to hearing impairment. As such, all provisions and actions driven by the government for the Deaf community serve the purpose of aiding “integration,” rather than supporting education and communication that appeals directly to those with hearing impairments, specifically through the use of sign language. The HKSAR Social Welfare Department, for instance, provide services for “Preschool Disabled Children,” “Vocational Rehabilitation” and “Community Support,” again for the “disabled” (2017). All of these focus on integrating those with hearing impairment into mainstream society, be it in education, careers or socially. There is no mention of sign language support, a policy that has been heavily criticised as the use of sign language has been shown to greatly aid the cognitive development of Deaf children (The Centre for Sign Linguistics and Deaf Studies, CUHK, 2013).

Perhaps the most troubling thing, however, is how the medical condition of deafness is defined as a “disability” by the HKSAR government. Because their policy is based on this definition, it ignores the social and cultural aspect of Deafhood and the importance of Deaf culture to empowering those with hearing impairment. This attitude has permeated into mainstream society in Hong Kong, effectively marking hearing impairments as a sign of inferiority or “disability” and thus fuelling audist prejudice and discrimination. We can see the effects of this attitude within mainstream education with Youth A, who used to study in a mainstream school but was bullied by her peers. Fortunately, it was brought to her mother’s attention and Youth A was then transferred to a special school in Form 2. The separation between the hearing-abled and Deaf worlds can be explained with the emblem that describes a particular identity as a public construction (Agha, 2006):

As the Hearing community marks sign language and oralism as the diacritics of Deaf members, it is likely Youth A’s classmates in the mainstream school saw her as different and bullied her for her hearing impairment. The fact that the government is closing down one out of the two remaining specialist schools for the Deaf in the near future, to promote inclusive education, may strengthen the established barrier in school between the hearing-able and the hearing-impaired, especially if no further action is taken to discourage discrimination in schools.

In contrast with Youth A’s salient Deafness while in mainstream education, Student 1, who is currently in tertiary-level education, chooses not to associate herself with the Deaf community, and so her educational journey was a lot more inclusive than Youth A. This was possibly an available choice for her because of her comparatively mild hearing impairment. We can see the extent to which government policy has impacted upon the identity of the Deaf community in Hong Kong through Student 1’s decision to reject her Deaf identity in order to fully integrate into Hong Kong society:

H: Maybe we should come back to um, yeah so I guess it’s more do you feel like you belong to the hearing world?

S: Er, I think mm, I should belong, I belong to the hearing world.

H: Yeah.

S: Yes because um, I just have the mild hearing impairment.

H: Yeah

S: Um I can talk, I can communicate, I can hear er with the normal, just like normal people so I think I am in the hearing world, yes, er I also want people to treat me as normal people instead of disabled, yeah.

Student 1 establishes a dichotomy of “normal” and “disabled” with reference to deafness, implicitly suggesting that more serious hearing impairments can be considered a disability, while her own high frequency hearing impairment positions her in the “normal” or Hearing world. This explicitly links to the social ideology that the Deaf community are disabled and thus should be treated differently, unless they can conform to the ideals of mainstream society i.e. the Hearing world in the way that Student A can due to the mildness of her hearing impairment. Her emphatic declarative “I should belong to the hearing world” demonstrates her conscious effort to emerge as hearing-able, distancing herself from the Deaf community in order to fit in with “normal people.” By positioning herself in this way, Student A implies that the Deaf community are discriminated against because they are perceived as “disabled,” and so to avoid this discrimination she does not associate with Deaf culture.

Hong Kong Census data has found that discrimination and marginalisation towards Deaf individuals begin as early as primary school, despite the government's inclusive policies in education. In fact, according to Ms. L, it is partially due to inclusive education that the needs of Deaf students are not sufficiently nor effectively catered to:

L: Quite frankly, I am personally against inclusive education. But our voices aren’t always heard or accounted for. Before carrying out inclusive education, the government asked for public opinion on the matter, which drew a lot of affirmative responses - "combining both communities (hearing & deaf) is a great idea!” But perhaps it only works with certain, select social elements, and not something like learning environment. I have my reservations [on inclusive education].

In the interview, Ms.L is steadfast in expressing her opposition to inclusive education because it overlooks the specific learning needs (i.e. slower learning speeds, required repeated practice, delayed reaction to instructions) and even social needs of Deaf students (i.e. interacting with hearing peers) and fails to deliver on its promises of inclusion. She argues that while 'inclusive education' sounds good in concept and has been supported by the well-intentioned Hearing public - who are oblivious to the nuances of teaching and learning for a hearing-impaired student - it has not worked at all in practice (Napier, 2002). Ms. L suggests that the integration of Deaf individuals in the mainstream society may work better in smaller social occasions (i.e. sports, music) but not education, where the needs of hearing students and Deaf students are so fundamentally different that most mainstream schools are not equipped to manage.

The very concept of inclusive education, in some ways, undermines the construction of difference between hearing students and deaf students (Bucholtz and Hall, 2005). By putting students with distinctly different learning needs in the same school, their differences are reduced to a minimum, which puts the Deaf students at a disadvantageous position. According to Ms. L, most Deaf students are not sufficiently similar to hearing students in their learning approach and needs to be placed in the same schools; she laments the closing down of multiple special education schools as a by-product of ineffective inclusive education.

It is not only in education that a policy of inclusiveness can actually hinder the Deaf individual – the social aspect of Deafhood also relies on those with hearing impairments marking themselves as different and gaining a sense of belonging and identity from this, by connecting with others who share their impairment. In the case of Youth A, transferring from mainstream to specialised education helped her to accept that she is different from the hearing-able and feel comfortable with this, rather than held back by it. She now positions herself as a part of both the Hearing and Deaf worlds; she has made hearing-able friends who truly accept her as she is in the special school as well as her workplace, while having no issues signing with her Deaf peers. Therefore, this shows that Youth A’s inclusiveness varies from the social circles she is in, as reflected in her experience in the mainstream school as opposed to the special school and her current working environment.

While the government do provide assistance for the Deaf community, Youth A admits that there remain obstacles in their daily lives due to lack of comprehensive support. For instance, the government has yet to offer subtitles or sign language for live television shows, despite numerous requests from the Deaf community (Hong Kong Society for the Deaf, 2014. This again neglects social inclusiveness because the needs of the Deaf community are not sufficiently catered for, which causes them to miss out on events that were originally meant for everyone in Hong Kong:

K: Do you think the Hong Kong government provides enough resources to the Deaf community?

YA: Sorry?

K: (slowly) The government-

YA: (trying to catch the words) the government-

K: providing resources and aid to the Deaf community – are they sufficient?

YA: Right now, there are some live television shows that do not have subtitles. Sometimes I really want to watch them but I have no idea what they are saying. Also, we have some seniors who requested the government to include some sign language or subtitles [for the live television shows] but the government did not respond to them.

This reveals a discrepancy in governmental policy towards the Deaf community because, though they encourage those with hearing impairments to “integrate” with mainstream society, they do not provide the tools necessary to do this, even actively exclude them from society by depriving them of current news. This suggests that sign language and, by extension, Deaf culture is overlooked in Hong Kong, thereby silencing those with hearing impairments and preventing them from the integration that the government apparently aims to give them.