Negotiating academic environments: using Lefebvre to conceptualise deaf spaces and disabling/enabling environments

Abstract

Research at York St John (RaY) is an institutional repository. It supports the principles of open access by making the research outputs of the University available in digital form.

Accessibility of the Built Environment for People with Sensory Disabilities—Review Quality and Representation of Evidence

“…Strong colour and tonal contrasts can be used as well to help residual sight users provide missing information [8,31,45]. Alternatively, people with auditory or hearing disabilities rely on clear visual cues to help provide the missing information from the lack of sound [19,[21][22][23]47]. Therefore, due to the opposite types of sensory cues, the important distinctions between the two communities need to be properly addressed [24].…”

“…community encounters when using public transportation systems. O'Brien deduced that the research surrounding the d/Deaf community focuses primarily on the social impacts of their disability [22], and research is needed to understand and address other key areas of the built environment to ensure that it is fully accessible. The quantitative examination of the research on people with visual and hearing impairments, respectively reproduced in Tables 1 and 2, shows the diversity of the population, research methods, and assistive aids, as well as the low number of people participating in these studies.…”

“…Another study was conducted by O'Brien, where five academics who are d/Deaf were interviewed to understand and experience how the academics who are d/Deaf navigate the physical environments of their workplaces at Higher Education Institutes (HEI) [22]. With the concept of DeafSpace expanding into how individuals who are d/Deaf change their environment, many individuals in HEI must adapt their workspace to fit their needs.…”

“…People with hearing disabilities are presented with barriers to their communication, especially when considering the signing population, and much of the associated research focuses on the social aspect of accessibility within the interior environment. Communication through visual means is one of the key features to accommodate the hard-of-hearing community, regardless of whether the individual uses assistive hearing devices, lip-reading, or sign language [19,[21][22][23].…”

Theorising the deaf body: using Lefebvre and Bourdieu to understand deaf spatial experience

“…One such example is the term 'good attitude', which is often deployed to describe hearing people who 'fit' into deaf spaces. 87 This 'good attitude' does not necessarily coincide with the ability to sign, 88 but shows an understanding of the doxa of the deaf space, a feel for the rules of the game and a willingness to recognise deaf people and bodies as valid bearers of capital. On a similar note, the CODA body as bearer of capital valued by both deaf and hearing communities, as embodiment of habitus inscribed by access to both deaf and hearing fields could be an area ripe for exploration.…”