"Do you lipread?" Reframed

Discussing how I respond to the question "Do you lipread?" and approach service personnel and why I do it this way.

Recently, I took my dog to the vet, and after
waiting, the doctor came in. The first thing
he did was look at me and asked "Do you
lipread?"

I looked back at him and signed "Yes, do you
understand sign language?"

He looked at me with incomprehension, and
then wrote

"Do you lipread at all?"

So I wrote back, "Do you understand sign at
all?"

He almost immediately got a look that said
"point taken"

and after that we wrote back and forth with
no problem.

Why do I do that? By looking at me and
asking if I lipread,

he put a frame on me that I am handicapped,
and that I need to lipread to accommodate
him.

I rejected that frame and put a different
frame on myself --

that we use two different, but equal
languages. His language is spoken, mine is
signed.

Nothing to do with not being able to hear or
lipread or being handicapped or disabled or
"broken".

The new frame is that I use a different
language, and if he doesn't understand me,
it's the same with me to him.

Easy way to make that point!

Same thing when I order at a fast food
restaurant or enter a doctor's office for an
appointment or any situation where I need
customer service --

I approach these people and sign what I want.

I always, or almost always get a response of
"I don't understand what you're saying. Can
we write?" And that's always fine with me.

Sometimes, I get a nice surprise to find they
learned sign in High School or College or
their parents are Deaf

and we conduct our business much more easily.

Why do I do that?

Suppose I were to approach them and verbally
speak what I wanted.

It would mean that they might overlook the
fact that I'm Deaf, and therefore have no
exposure to the fact that there are Deaf
people out there.

Also, it would again be a case of my
accommodation to them, without their learning
how to accommodate to me or other Deaf
people.

Suppose I were to instead approach them and
gesture that I'm Deaf and ask if we can
write,

the frame gets put on me that "He's
handicapped, he can't talk", and they
grudgingly get out paper and pencil to write.

Doing it this way allows them to maintain
that "handicapped" framing.

So instead, I approach them by signing, and
often what happens is that

I see their mental gears turning and thinking
"I don't understand him!" Not, "He doesn't
understand me" --

"I don't understand him". They're the ones
with the problem (not me).

Doing this, I give them exposure to Deaf
people,

plus, I make them think "How can I work with
this Deaf person?"

When they suggest we write, and it is
simplified communication between us, they
will remember this the next time they meet a
Deaf person.

They will just whip out that paper and pen
quickly.

And again, I'm helping to create a new
reframing -- not one of being handicapped,

but one of linguistic difference -- they
don't understand my language,

so how can we work together on an even level?

Through writing.

Frames are powerful things!