Fernandes Still Hurting Gallaudet
Even though Fernandes has been gone for little over a month, her legacy is still being played out in the media, as indicated by the article below printed yesterday.
We know that Jane Fernandes didn’t have the best interests of Gallaudet at heart when she played the “Deaf card” instead of addressing the real issues behind the rejection of her appointment as the ninth president.
http://wiki.signcasts.com/index.php?title=Protest_Issues:_Myth_vs._FactÂ
The BoT has been derelict in its duty for who knows how long. Had it been receptive to Gallaudet’s stakeholders, the protest would never have happened in the first place. There were signs of improvement when BoT rescinded Fernandes’ appointment, and in extending an invitation for more stakeholders in the search for an interim president.
Now we need to demand that BoT compel the Public Relations office to do their job to stop the legacy of “the deaf card” left by Fernandes so Gallaudet can heal and move on.
Let BOT HEAR you.
Here is the link to BoT Contacts: http://blog.deafread.com/mishkazena/2006/12/03/let-bot-hear-you/
No hearing need apply?
Editorial
Published December 2, 2006
Campus life is calm again after months of noisy protests at Gallaudet University, the nation’s only university for the deaf and hearing impaired. Still raging is a wider culture war, of sorts, that reaches far beyond the university’s walls.A student and faculty uproar erupted in May over the appointment of provost Jane Fernandes to be the next president at the Washington, D.C., institution whose charter was signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1864. Fernandes’ promotion was withdrawn in October by university trustees to placate the protesters. She said her opponents believe she is “not deaf enough”–she speaks and can read lips, but she didn’t learn American Sign Language until she was a young adult. Critics responded that she was too autocratic and had been installed by a selection process that didn’t include students. Fernandes, protesters said, was “playing the deaf card” to win public sympathy.Nearly two decades ago, vociferous protests by students and alumni led to the naming of I. King Jordan as the first deaf president of Gallaudet. Jordan, who is retiring, supported the appointment of Fernandes, but to no avail. Underlying the protests is a widely studied and widely disputed set of customs, values and beliefs known as deaf culture. It unites a worldwide subcommunity of the deaf in the way other cultures are united by a shared history, values and language. In this case, the language is sign language. The usage, inflections, grammar and “accents” of one’s signing can have special significance in deaf culture that is difficult for the hearing to comprehend.But deaf culture finds itself threatened by technology that allows more people to hear. Some who are determined to preserve the culture go so far as to denounce cochlear implants, portable devices that carry sound impulses to the brain, as “cultural genocide.”Some of the movement’s most passionate supporters embrace the world of silence to the point of insisting that deafness need not be “cured.” A famous and poignant example is chronicled in the six-year-old documentary “Sound and Fury” by filmmaker Josh Aronson. The film follows a deaf family in which the parents are pleased when their children are born deaf, and they resist cochlear implants.The hearing may never comprehend what could drive such a view. Why would one reject a medical advancement that allows someone to more easily communicate with the rest of the world? Why would someone argue that that is anything but an individual decision?Proponents of deaf culture have made a great contribution to broader awareness of the deaf. They were important proponents of the Americans with Disabilities Act. But the ultimate rejection of Jane Fernandes at Gallaudet–largely because she wasn’t “deaf enough”–is difficult to fathom.
Copyright © 2006,
Even though Fernandes has been gone for little over a month, her legacy is still being played out in the media, as indicated by the article below printed yesterday.
We know that Jane Fernandes didn’t have the best interests of Gallaudet at heart when she played the “Deaf card” instead of addressing the real issues behind the rejection of her appointment as the ninth president.
http://wiki.signcasts.com/index.php?title=Protest_Issues:_Myth_vs._FactÂ
The BoT has been derelict in its duty for who knows how long. Had it been receptive to Gallaudet’s stakeholders, the protest would never have happened in the first place. There were signs of improvement when BoT rescinded Fernandes’ appointment, and in extending an invitation for more stakeholders in the search for an interim president.
Now we need to demand that BoT compel the Public Relations office to do their job to stop the legacy of “the deaf card” left by Fernandes so Gallaudet can heal and move on.
Let BOT HEAR you.
Here is the link to BoT Contacts: http://blog.deafread.com/mishkazena/2006/12/03/let-bot-hear-you/
No hearing need apply?
Editorial
Published December 2, 2006
Campus life is calm again after months of noisy protests at Gallaudet University, the nation’s only university for the deaf and hearing impaired. Still raging is a wider culture war, of sorts, that reaches far beyond the university’s walls.A student and faculty uproar erupted in May over the appointment of provost Jane Fernandes to be the next president at the Washington, D.C., institution whose charter was signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1864. Fernandes’ promotion was withdrawn in October by university trustees to placate the protesters. She said her opponents believe she is “not deaf enough”–she speaks and can read lips, but she didn’t learn American Sign Language until she was a young adult. Critics responded that she was too autocratic and had been installed by a selection process that didn’t include students. Fernandes, protesters said, was “playing the deaf card” to win public sympathy.Nearly two decades ago, vociferous protests by students and alumni led to the naming of I. King Jordan as the first deaf president of Gallaudet. Jordan, who is retiring, supported the appointment of Fernandes, but to no avail. Underlying the protests is a widely studied and widely disputed set of customs, values and beliefs known as deaf culture. It unites a worldwide subcommunity of the deaf in the way other cultures are united by a shared history, values and language. In this case, the language is sign language. The usage, inflections, grammar and “accents” of one’s signing can have special significance in deaf culture that is difficult for the hearing to comprehend.But deaf culture finds itself threatened by technology that allows more people to hear. Some who are determined to preserve the culture go so far as to denounce cochlear implants, portable devices that carry sound impulses to the brain, as “cultural genocide.”Some of the movement’s most passionate supporters embrace the world of silence to the point of insisting that deafness need not be “cured.” A famous and poignant example is chronicled in the six-year-old documentary “Sound and Fury” by filmmaker Josh Aronson. The film follows a deaf family in which the parents are pleased when their children are born deaf, and they resist cochlear implants.The hearing may never comprehend what could drive such a view. Why would one reject a medical advancement that allows someone to more easily communicate with the rest of the world? Why would someone argue that that is anything but an individual decision?Proponents of deaf culture have made a great contribution to broader awareness of the deaf. They were important proponents of the Americans with Disabilities Act. But the ultimate rejection of Jane Fernandes at Gallaudet–largely because she wasn’t “deaf enough”–is difficult to fathom.
Copyright © 2006,
December 3rd, 2006 at 1:40 pm
I agreed that JKF has hurt not only the Gallaudet University community but also Deaf people’s intellectual life. Gallaudet University has watered down its mission statement from “academic excellence” to “diversity, inclusiveness and respect”, which could be viewed as an implicit platform for JKF’s presidential candidacy.
December 3rd, 2006 at 3:31 pm
Hi, my name is Kayla and i live in Cali. im a daughter of a deaf mother, i am hearing though. I kno ASL very well its my first langugage obviously. i am taking a ASL class in high school and i am doing rescarch on the recent protesting at Gallaudet. I strongly agree with the protesting. deaf people deserve to have the president they want and one who has their best intrests at heart. I know what its like to want to culture of deaf people to be contuined, i also understand why they wouldnt want a president like Jane. I think its very intresting how people are always trying to “cure” the deaf. i think its wrong, personally id like to be deaf, im always around deaf people and i love to sign. if i were to have deaf kids thers no way i would ever want my kids to have implants to make it better, sign language is a beautiful language and i wouldnt want it to ever go away.
December 3rd, 2006 at 3:33 pm
I fail to see what is wrong with that article? It is good reporting. Editorial points out Fernandes’s view and student’s view about the protest. It is just reporting facts of BOTH sides. Whether who believes what resides with the reader. What happen to the first amendment rights of all? Nothing in the article bashes one or the other..just responsible reporting.
December 3rd, 2006 at 3:46 pm
Carl, interesting. Fernandes didn’t promote academic excellence along with diversity, inclusion, and respect? I didn’t realize that before.
Hi, Kayla. How cool that you are taking an ASL class. It is wonderful that you have a positive attitude toward Deaf people!
G, The issue is that Fernandes is still promoting a lie. The rejection of her appointment as the ninth president has nothing to do with her being “Not Deaf Enough” and she knows it very well. She had been playing the deaf card from very beginning when it was her poor administrative skills that the majority of Gallaudet stakeholders didn’t want her.
December 3rd, 2006 at 6:53 pm
Everytime that I read the HLAA magazine article, September/October issue, volumne 27 issue # 5, and read the article, JANE FERNANDES 9th PRESIDENT OF GALLAUDET,..I feel a chill go down my spine as I realize that this article was wriiten by people, who didn’t take the “Unity For Gallaudet” protest seriously enough to even think that it would continue till the students reached their goals!!
Stop and think about that!!
The very students of the University, that J. Fernandes planned to be president of, were not given credit for their opinions or given much thought as forces for change as late as the printing of this article!!
The spin doctors, who put this article out, were counting on the protest to come to nothing as..”the deaf hate change and are like children, who if shown a firm hand,..will bend to the will of those,..duly appointed, in authority!!”
Think about that statement long and hard!!! Do you like being thought of as a “child?”
December 3rd, 2006 at 9:06 pm
G, read the last sentence again.
December 4th, 2006 at 12:54 am
Here’s an early article that shows that Fernandes is claiming she’s not “deaf enough”:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/04/AR2006050402095.html
Here is a statement from 9thprez.com where Fernandes admits that she spoke about the issue:
QUOTE:
Later, Dr. Fernandes was criticized for using this issue in the media as a reason for the protest. It was said that her actions created divisions within the deaf community and shed a bad light on the deaf community. In fact, she spoke about this issue in response to a flyer handed to her (and others at a large rally) that described complaints that she was not deaf enough.
[http://www.9thprez.com/protestissues.php]
UNQUOTE
Here is the mysterious flyer, which is probably fake:
http://gallyprotest.org/flyer.pdf
If you look at it, you see that it looks like someone deliberately created it to look blurry, as if it had been recopied many times. But modern photocopiers do such a good job of copying that they almost never turn out this blurry, even after several times of recopying.
Also, I never saw it in Tent City in May and I never heard of anyone who saw it. It wasn’t there. It has to be a fake.
Here is where the not “deaf enough” issue really started, in this book that Jordan helped to produce in the early 1990′s:
http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN1563681528&id=wG6JD6zLdh4C&pg=PA10&lpg=PA10&dq=%22deaf+enough%22&sig=s-80r6XsgaBt92dHnfXqTaDfgLM
Obviously, Jordan knew very well that the quote was in that book and he told Fernandes and the PR department to use it as a PR weapon to “divide and conquer” the deaf world.
This is what Ridor said on May 8:
QUOTE:
Fernandes’ Claims: Last week on Monday when the Protest first erupted, Dr. Fernandes claimed that it was because she was not “deaf enoughâ€, then on Wednesday, she claimed that the students rejected her because she learned ASL at a later age, thus became a victim of deaf cultural war. Then last night, she claimed that it is because of gender issues! She claimed that people do not like seeing the women in power making decisions. Please. Get. A. Clue. We have no problem with people like Roslyn Rosen and MJ Bienvenu to make hard decisions. It has so much to do with who/what Jane Fernandes is! Her work performance is appalling, to say the least.
[http://www.ridorlive.com/?p=1686#comments]
Here is Elisa’s first post about the protest. Nobody said anything about “not deaf enough”:
http://www.xanga.com/elisa_abenchuchan/479668118/item.html
This article in the Washington Post on the Internet late Monday evening, May 1st, and then was printed in the newspaper the next morning on Tuesday, May 2, 2006 claims that some protests wanted a president who grew up deaf:
QUOTE:
Some wanted a candidate who would promote “cultural deafness,” preferring those who grew up deaf and relied on American Sign Language.
[http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/01/AR2006050100770.html]
UNQUOTE
On May 2, there was one student shown on the 5:00 pm news on ABC 7 TV that said:
“We need a person who grew up deaf.”
http://www.createphpbb.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=49&mforum=gallypost
But that student might have been influenced from reading the Washington Post article from that morning.
It seems that it was the Washington Post writer who first confused the very valid issue of promoting cultural deafness, with the unimportant issue of growing up deaf.
One wonders who the Washington Post writer spoke with and what they said. Maybe the writer will release her notes to the Gallaudet archives.
December 4th, 2006 at 12:55 am
Here’s an early article that shows that Fernandes is claiming she’s not “deaf enough”:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/04/AR2006050402095.html
Here is a statement from 9thprez.com where Fernandes admits that she spoke about the issue:
QUOTE:
Later, Dr. Fernandes was criticized for using this issue in the media as a reason for the protest. It was said that her actions created divisions within the deaf community and shed a bad light on the deaf community. In fact, she spoke about this issue in response to a flyer handed to her (and others at a large rally) that described complaints that she was not deaf enough.
[http://www.9thprez.com/protestissues.php]
UNQUOTE
Here is where the not “deaf enough” issue really started, in this book that Jordan helped to produce in the early 1990′s:
http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN1563681528&id=wG6JD6zLdh4C&pg=PA10&lpg=PA10&dq=%22deaf+enough%22&sig=s-80r6XsgaBt92dHnfXqTaDfgLM
Obviously, Jordan knew very well that the quote was in that book and he told Fernandes and the PR department to use it as a PR weapon to “divide and conquer” the deaf world.
This is what Ridor said on May 8:
QUOTE:
Fernandes’ Claims: Last week on Monday when the Protest first erupted, Dr. Fernandes claimed that it was because she was not “deaf enoughâ€, then on Wednesday, she claimed that the students rejected her because she learned ASL at a later age, thus became a victim of deaf cultural war. Then last night, she claimed that it is because of gender issues! She claimed that people do not like seeing the women in power making decisions. Please. Get. A. Clue. We have no problem with people like Roslyn Rosen and MJ Bienvenu to make hard decisions. It has so much to do with who/what Jane Fernandes is! Her work performance is appalling, to say the least.
[http://www.ridorlive.com/?p=1686#comments]
Here is Elisa’s first post about the protest. Nobody said anything about “not deaf enough”:
http://www.xanga.com/elisa_abenchuchan/479668118/item.html
December 4th, 2006 at 10:44 pm
Stanelle, bingo. How insulting it is to infer that the college students are incapable of independent thinking!
December 4th, 2006 at 11:24 pm
It’s perfectly appropriate, however. Of course she’s not going to think her students are capable of independent thought – she knows she was supposed to educate them, and failed in that task as well.
Too bad for her it doesn’t take a college degree to know when you’ve been cheated, lied to, and taken advantage of.
December 5th, 2006 at 1:50 am
Josh,
Your comment seems to contradict itself. There’s nothing appropriate that I see in what you are talking about.
Jordan and Fernandes’ huge, huge error was underestimating their opponents. Deaf people are a whole lot smarter and more educated than Jordan and Fernandes realized.
When you think about it, there was nothing Jordan or Fernandes could have done to stop the protest from succeeding. The protesters were extremely savvy, extremely well organized, and their tactics were extremely effective (and justified.)