The social construction of ‘deafness’: explored through the experiences of Black South African mothers raising a deaf child

What is it about?

Individual realities and perceptions are embedded in a web of dominant social and cultural views which shape the individual. Mothers of deaf children therefore cannot be understood in isolation, and neither can their experiences, perceptions, and well-being. The present research investigated the construction of deafness through the experiences of mothers raising a deaf child and considered the manner in which these constructions impacted their well-being and relationship with the child. The study explored the experiences of six Black South African hearing mothers of a deaf child between the ages of 3 and 8 years. Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted. Through an interpretive theoretical framework, this qualitative study noted seven main themes, namely, deafness is foreign and unknown, increased awareness and normalising of deafness, religious and Traditional African beliefs about disability/deafness, external pity and the mother’s rejection of it, the discourse of the ‘superiority’ of speech and encouragement of speech and hearing, barriers to communicating with her child, and ‘Why me?’ attribution of cause and the emergence of blame. Extrapolation of the data suggests that there is a lack of awareness regarding the deaf individual, and this creates misinformed perceptions about deafness which impact negatively both mother and child.

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