Hearing Culture Vs Deaf Culture

Anywhere you go in the world, you will discover different cultures. Every culture is unique in so many ways, from social interactions to food to religion. The collectivist culture of the Deaf is very different from the hearing Americans and their individualism. In See What I Mean, I learned three extreme social differences between Deaf and hearing cultures. The first way the two cultures are severely different is with information sharing and privacy. In hearing culture, it is considered rude to talk about financial matters, whether it’s how much someone spent on a new object, or how much money they make. It is private information. But for the Deaf, they often find it more difficult to convey information from hearing people, so they sometimes don’t know about the best prices or deals. For the Deaf, sharing information is very important! The Deaf community looks out for each other, and if someone has found a good discount or price, it is their duty as a Deaf person to tell all of the Deaf people they know! It is considered rude to hold information that could be beneficial to other Deaf people. The second way the Deaf have a different culture than the hearing is their way of giving criticism and feedback. For hearing people, we don’t strictly convey bad feedback, because it could offend the person. We often sandwich the

I was surprised to learn that in Deaf culture, it is not considered rude to give negative feedback so frankly, or to directly ask about any physical change. For Deaf people, their form of communication is helpful, friendly, and considerate. But to a hearing person, it can be offensive, rude, and disrespectful. These are one of the reasons that many hearing people have a hard time interacting with the Deaf. It’s interesting to see the differences between these two cultures, and why those differences