Assignment 2 – Research

Apart from my own knowledge of deafness growing up with a profoundly deaf mother I have been searching for books / articles on deafness as well as deaf photographers. I am hoping that I van gain an insight into the ‘feeling’ of deafness and in turn how I can portray it.

I have also been watching some TV with ear defenders on and subtitles, much to the annoyance of my husband. Apparently he can’t ‘hear’ the TV with the subtitles on despite it being on full volume. The text is distracting him so I have saved this experiment for when he is out. I have also acquired some ‘In-ear’ defenders which I can wear out and about for the day, these do not cancel out the noise so much but would at least render me ‘hard of hearing’.

Whilst wearing the ear defenders I have noticed that deafness is indeed not silent, I can hear my heartbeat and the whooshing of my blood. Some programs I can follow with ease however programs such as ‘The Apprentice’ are really difficult to understand as the scenes jump around and context is lost. I can follow it only because I usually watch it and I understand the style of the program. I can appreciate now why there are some programs which my mum really dislikes and cannot understand. I find that in following the text I am missing out on watching the expressions of the actors and the actual program itself, my eyes are continually flicking between the two, its hard work!