Am I a Deaf?

Strategic foreclosures by signed Japanese signers

Abstract

In this paper, I focus of Signed Japanese (SJ) and its signers that are externalized as a "not sign language" or "not Deaf people," based on the field data which I gathered from participant observation. SJ is "not sign language" in sign language linguistics, and as a result, SJ signers have been placed in a suspended state of "being nothing." However, SJ signers have been weaving a peaceful life as Deaf people who are "not Deaf, but rather Deaf people," strategically foreclose some Japanese Sign Language (JSL) signers and good sense who consider only JSL signers as "right" Deaf people. Against this background, I propose that there be often a divergence between the academic definition of the concept of "Deaf" and the widely shared definition of "Deaf" in the Deaf community, and I argue that it is not possible to show the superiority of one definition over the other.