Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Deaf members

[Hafidha Sofia (hafidhaao]

The year before the pandemic, our community was gifted such a sound system, and 
it was not utilized well or consistently. It took months to get it set up (it 
requires A/V knowledge or professional installation), and then there were 
frequent technical issues afterward. And the other issue was that most people 
didn’t want to use a microphone during meetings. The classic, “Oh I don’t need 
that, I have a loud voice.” 

There was a real tendency for people to view using the microphone as a personal 
decision instead of as a thing needed to make the space accessible for 
everyone.  

My suggestion is that communities understand that simply having the tech isn’t 
enough. It would help to have clear guidelines around using the microphone. 
Moving forward (post pandemic) I am going to advise my community to make mic 
use mandatory at monthly house meetings. And during weekly announcements. Both 
of these are held in the space where we have this audio system set up. It also 
requires some training to get a lot of folks comfortable with operating the 
system. Inaccessibility is by design, so there has to be clear intention and 
commitment to change our spaces in order to make accessibility a reality. 

Hafidha
Songaia Cohousing
Washington State, USA



Sent from my iPhone

> On Apr 25, 2021, at 10:28 AM, MJ Phillips <mjphillips [at] pobox.com> wrote:
> 
> fwiw, I just listened to a talk on hearing loss given by our town’s council 
> on aging. The speaker mentioned hearing aids that can be tuned to the 
> television to make hearing that clearer. I wonder if there is similar 
> technology that could be adapted to/for meetings- ie, if the speaker were to 
> use a microphone that was somehow linked to the hearing aids? (and if the mic 
> were to be passed around to make it really clear who was speaking and make 
> sure all comments go into the mic)?
> 
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