• Green Light: Fearless Leader

    This is the third post of my autobiographical series on my experiences with hearing loss. You can view the first (here) and second (here) ones as well. Posts appear every other Friday.  II. Fearless Leader When you’re a little kid, so many things can mean the world to you. You may be unable to explain why,… Continue Reading

  • Green Light: Seeing Sounds

    This is the second of an autobiographical series on my experiences with hearing loss. Posts shall appear every other Friday. You can view the first post here. I. Seeing Sounds I lost my hearing at the age of four following a serious bout of meningitis, but my world never became silent. I may not have heard… Continue Reading

  • A Digital Reader

    I was invited by Karen Bourrier, the project director of Nineteenth-Century Disability: A Digital Reader to write a post about a Victorian mourning ear trumpet. The digital reader is a remarkable project at the University of Western Ontario, an interdisciplinary approach to provide a collection of primary texts on physical and cognitive disability in the nineteenth century.… Continue Reading

  • The FM Listening System

    Do you recall how I wrote previously that there’s hardly any pictures of me with my hearing aids revealed, except in some grade school photos? Well, look what I found… Don’t be fooled by my smile. It is for the camera only and does not reveal my exasperated hate for the awful, dreaded, FM listening system. What… Continue Reading

  • Dancing

    A while back me and some of my girlfriends went dancing. At the club, we encountered a group of some of my deaf friends, some who were profoundly deaf and could not hear or speak–but communicated via sign language. All of us went off to the dance floor. The music was, indeed, VERY loud. I’m… Continue Reading

  • Using an Ear Trumpet

    The other day I was conversing with my friend about what kind of hairstyles I planned to wear for my wedding. I remarked I would probably wear my hair down for the reception, since it will likely coordinate with my outfit. My friend told me I was silly–I should wear my hair up, in some… Continue Reading

  • The Construction of Norms: Deafness in 17th to 19th Centuries

    The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science has a fantastic project directed by Sabine Arnaud, The Construction of Norms in 17th to 19th Century Europe and the United States. A description of the project: This research group works on deafness and hysteria from the early seventeenth to the late nineteenth century as two sites of conflicting new… Continue Reading

  • Deaf World/Hearing World

    As some of you may have gathered from my Tweets, my paper has been selected for the Deaf World/Hearing World: Spaces, Techniques, and Things in Culture and History Conference to take place on December 10-11 in Berlin. The conference is sponsored by the Max Planck Institute and Project Biocultures at the University of Chicago. The… Continue Reading

  • Off to Leeds!

    I’m headed out to Leeds, UK for the Disability & the Victorians: Confronting Legacies Conference to be held at Leeds-Trinity University College. This should be an interesting conference for me, for it’s the first time I’m presenting a paper to an audience composed of historians and other scholars of deaf and disability studies. I’m really… Continue Reading

  • Meeting of the Three Societies

    In case you haven’t gathered from my increased Twitter activity this last week, I’ve been at the meeting of the Three Societies. Philadelphia is a gorgeous, historic city, and I found it to be an ideal setting for the meeting. And what a great meeting it was! It was fantastic to finally meet some of… Continue Reading

  • Philadelphia Bound!

    Like hundreds of other scholars, I’m headed to Philadelphia for The Three Societies meeting: a joint meeting of the  History of Science Society, British Society for the History of Science and Canadian Society for the History and Philosophy of Science. It takes place every four years, so I’m excited for my first ever participation in this meeting. And of… Continue Reading