{"id":14941,"date":"2011-07-06T00:08:22","date_gmt":"2011-07-06T05:08:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deafnetwork.com\/wordpress\/?p=14941"},"modified":"2011-07-06T00:49:37","modified_gmt":"2011-07-06T05:49:37","slug":"thou-shalt-not-curse-the-deaf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deafnetwork.com\/wordpress\/blog\/2011\/07\/06\/thou-shalt-not-curse-the-deaf\/","title":{"rendered":"Thou Shalt Not Curse The Deaf"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thou Shalt Not Curse The Deaf<\/strong><\/p>\n

One woman\u2019s struggle to make Jewish life accessible for herself and others.<\/p>\n

Alexis Kashar<\/p>\n

Tuesday, July 5, 2011<\/p>\n

I was fortunate to be born into a Jewish family with three generations of
\ndeaf members. Both of my parents are deaf, as were my paternal grandparents.
\nThis was an ideal situation for a deaf child, as I considered myself
\nfortunate to have parents who made sure I had full access to language
\nthrough sign language at home. Given that I was a typical member of my
\nfamily, I considered myself the same as everyone else.<\/p>\n

At the same time, my parents had very restricted access to Jewish communal
\nlife while growing up. My father\u2019s experience as a bar mitzvah consisted of
\nbeing called up to the bima one morning and being asked to read a passage.
\nTo this day, he has no idea what he read. My mother was the only deaf member
\nof her family and did not sign until she was in her late teens. She attended
\na non-signing Jewish program for deaf children, but stopped attending after
\none year because it was too difficult to learn this way. Nevertheless, they
\nremain proud Jews to this day. The word \u201ccan\u2019t\u201d is not in my parents\u2019
\nvocabulary. They always see the potential and the positive in every facet of
\nlife.<\/p>\n

I grew up in a very culturally Jewish neighborhood on Long Island and led a
\nvery culturally Jewish life there. There was no doubt in my mind that to be
\nat home meant that I was in a Jewish environment. However, because my family
\ndid not have access to synagogue life nor any other part of Jewish communal
\norganizational life, neither my sister nor I received a formal Jewish
\neducation.<\/p>\n

My identification as a Jew cemented when my family moved to Fort Worth,
\nTexas when I was in the 8th grade. My sister and I were the only Jews in our
\nhigh school and felt different from the others, who were active participants
\nin many Christian groups. At the University of Texas at Austin, I joined a
\nJewish sorority. There, I felt at home. This played a very large role in how
\nthe rest of my life\u2019s story plays out.<\/p>\n

I remained at the University of Texas for both undergraduate and law school
\nand met my husband, who is hearing, there. After graduation from law school,
\nwe relocated to Los Angeles where we both began our law practices. I focused
\non civil rights as well as special education law \u2014 fighting for access for
\nchildren who were denied an appropriate education. I also had the
\nopportunity to break new ground with the Americans with Disabilities Act
\nlaw, as it was passed around the time I started my practice.<\/p>\n

As I was forging ahead professionally, we had three children, all of them
\nhearing. It was in my role as a mother \u2014 raising three hearing Jewish
\nchildren \u2014 where I faced the greatest challenge with respect to Jewish
\ncommunal life.<\/p>\n

Like most Jews, I want to give my children the gift of moral stability. I
\nwant them to become full-fledged members of the Jewish community. For this
\nto happen, I had to become a member of a synagogue, go to services and
\nbecome a practicing Jew so that I could share this experience with my
\nchildren and be a role model for them.<\/p>\n

However, I was not prepared for what happened next. I was told that access
\nto the Jewish world for deaf people like me was restricted, since sign
\nlanguage interpreters were not normally provided. I was asked to create
\naccess on my own. It was the equivalent of asking those who use wheelchairs
\nto build their own ramps.<\/p>\n

We relocated to Scarsdale, in Westchester County, seven years ago. My
\nchallenges with the Jewish world increased when my oldest child was getting
\nready to become a bat mitzvah. To kick off the preparation for this process,
\nwe were asked by her religious school to attend a Shabbat retreat. I am
\nembarrassed to admit that I almost skipped this event altogether, because I
\nwas not sure how to create the access that I needed without being intrusive.
\nI was also burnt out from fighting for access to several important events
\nwithin the Jewish community. I had begun to give up on my own religious
\nheritage.<\/p>\n

Fortunately around that time, I became actively involved with the Jewish
\nDeaf Resource Center. The co-founder, Naomi Brunnlehrmann, provided me with
\nthe support I needed. She agreed to work with me, encouraged me to make the
\nShabbat retreat a priority and offered her services as an interpreter for
\nthe event. A trilingual interpreter, she is able to interpret Jewish prayer
\nfrom Hebrew to American Sign Language (ASL) as well as to interpret from
\nEnglish to ASL and vice versa. An interpreter who is unable to interpret
\nHebrew would not have been able to make the Shabbaton accessible. The same
\nchallenge occurs when live captioning is offered as an accommodation at a
\nconference or other location. If the stenographer does not know Hebrew, all
\nthat appears on the screen is, \u201cHebrew being spoken.\u201d<\/p>\n

My daughter and I ended up going to the retreat. It was so meaningful that I
\nbecame even more committed to the planning and success of her bat mitzvah.
\nAnd the Torah portion assigned to Leah was the Leviticus portion about the
\ncommandment that forbids cursing the deaf or placing a stumbling block
\nbefore the blind. To me this means that according to Jewish law, the Jewish
\ncommunity is obligated to welcome those who are deaf or blind.<\/p>\n

I am determined that my children and future generations are able to
\nexperience all that the Jewish world has to offer. I have come to believe
\nthat the Jewish community wants to include everyone in the tent and will do
\nso once it understands what barriers it needs to remove on the pathway
\ninside.<\/p>\n

There are a few stumbling blocks that need to be chipped away. Many people
\nperceive the accommodations to be quite costly in light of how many deaf or
\nhard-of-hearing people require the service. However, aside from the fact
\nthat the Jewish community has a moral obligation to include everyone, what
\nmany fail to realize is that a significant number of people are impacted by
\nthe failure to accommodate a Jew who is deaf or hard of hearing. Most such
\nindividuals have immediate family members who are hearing, so when one
\nperson is without access, it often affects the entire extended family. For
\ninstance, when I do not attend a Jewish event, the number of Jews not
\nattending quickly grows to 14.<\/p>\n

On top of the general communication inaccessibility, the complexity of a
\nforeign language, in this case Hebrew, adds an extra barrier for those who
\nare deaf or hard of hearing. Another stumbling block, which has existed for
\nthousands of years, is the paternalistic view within Jewish law towards deaf
\nor hard-of-hearing people. This derives from the conventions established in
\nthe Talmud. However, I am proud to say that this spring, the Conservative
\nmovement\u2019s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards unanimously passed a
\nhistoric teshuvah recognizing Jews who are deaf and hard of hearing as
\nequals with the rest of the larger Conservative Jewish community.<\/p>\n

The teshuvah states in part:<\/p>\n

… the deaf who communicate via sign language and do not speak are no
\nlonger to be considered mentally incapacitated. Jews who are deaf are
\nresponsible for observing mitzvot. Our communities, synagogues, schools, and
\ncamps must strive to be welcoming and accessible, and inclusive. Sign
\nlanguage may be used in matters of personal status and may be used in
\nrituals. A deaf person called to the Torah who does not speak may recite the
\n[blessings] via sign language. A deaf person may serve as a [prayer leader]
\nin sign language in a minyan whose medium of communication is sign language.<\/p>\n

(A copy of the full teshuvah can be found at the website of the Rabbinical
\nAssembly: rabbinicalassembly.org)<\/p>\n

I realize that many attitudes and barriers that exist today will not be
\nremoved overnight. Access for Jews who are deaf or hard of hearing may
\nrequire some difficult choices and reworking of budgets. It is a matter of
\nmaking sure that Jewish organizations and synagogues are truly accessible to
\nall on a permanent basis.<\/p>\n

May it be God\u2019s will to help us work together. May God grant strength to
\nJews who are deaf to keep asking for access to Jewish life. May God also
\ngrant wisdom to all Jews so that access is provided to those who are deaf,
\nso that they are not cursed with a denial of access to Jewish life. May it
\nhappen soon and in our lifetime.<\/p>\n

Alexis Kashar is a civil rights attorney. She also serves as president of
\nthe board of the Jewish Deaf Resource Center, public policy chair of the
\nNational Association for the Deaf and president of the board of directors of
\nthe New York School for the Deaf.<\/p>\n

Source:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.thejewishweek.com\/special_sections\/text_context\/thou_shalt_not_curse_deaf<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thou Shalt Not Curse The Deaf One woman\u2019s struggle to make Jewish life accessible for herself and others. Alexis Kashar Tuesday, July 5, 2011 I was fortunate to be born into a Jewish family with three generations of deaf members.…<\/p>\n

Read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[9921,1629,9931,23,2871,21,9919,94,35,9925,24,5246,121,1412,9924,3992,9751,9746,9748,9920,3556,100,9928,630,9918,9922,304,9930,9926,191,9923,17,9932,9927,7889,9929],"class_list":["post-14941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-deaf-news","tag-alexis-kashar","tag-american-sign-language","tag-americans-with-disabilities-act-law","tag-asl","tag-attorney","tag-austin","tag-barriers","tag-church","tag-community","tag-conservative-movements-committee","tag-deaf","tag-deaf-children","tag-fort-worth","tag-hard-of-hearing","tag-hebrew","tag-jewish","tag-jewish-community","tag-jewish-deaf-resource-center","tag-jewish-law-and-standards","tag-jews","tag-lawyer","tag-nad","tag-naomi-brunnlehrmann","tag-national-association-of-the-deaf","tag-new-york-school-for-the-deaf","tag-rabbinical","tag-retreat","tag-scarsdale","tag-shabbaton","tag-sign-language","tag-teshuvah","tag-texas","tag-thou-shalt-not-curse-the-deaf","tag-trilingual-interpreter","tag-university-of-texas-at-austin","tag-westchester-county"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p752R-3SZ","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":19091,"url":"https:\/\/deafnetwork.com\/wordpress\/blog\/2012\/06\/21\/spurred-by-a-torah-portion-alexis-kashar-is-breaking-down-barriers-for-deaf-jews\/","url_meta":{"origin":14941,"position":0},"title":"Spurred by a Torah portion, Alexis Kashar is breaking down barriers for deaf Jews","author":"Grant Laird Jr","date":"June 21, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Spurred by a Torah portion, Alexis Kashar is breaking down barriers for deaf Jews By Lisa Keys June 13, 2012 NEW YORK (JTA) -- It was an ancient sentence -- a fragment, really -- that changed everything for Alexis Kashar. 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