Skip to main content

Doctoral Thesis



Abstract

Equality law is not working for Deaf people. The majority of deaf children attend mainstream schools without resource provision and are often denied the opportunity to engage with their deaf peers. Deaf people are likely to be in underemployment or unemployed and discrimination in the workplace is commonplace. There is evidence of injustice within the criminal justice system for deaf people, Deaf people are not able to serve their civic duty xas jurors, and their access to legal advice services is dire. Deaf prisoners suffer a ‘double sentence’ when in prison, and deaf people generally do not have access to healthcare services.

Thus, this thesis seeks to explore why equality law is not working for Deaf people, and what can be done to ensure that it does. In order to answer this research question, after a consideration of what evidence exists to suggest that Deaf people continue to experience inequalities, an attempt is made to ascertain why the framing of Deaf people as disabled is problematic, giving rise to what is termed the ‘Deaf Legal Dilemma,’ whereby Deaf people are faced with a stark choice: accept the disability label, or have no access to any rights at all. There is then an attempt to determine which concepts of equality are relevant to Deaf people, utilising a specific methodology that allows the author to categorise these concepts into either formal, substantive or transformative equality thus establishing a standard of measurement by which it is possible to determine how effective particular concepts of equality are in eradicating inequality.


A doctrinal analysis of equality law in the UK is then undertaken, incorporating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the European Convention on Human Rights, the Equality Act 2010 and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. These are critiqued in order to establish how they apply or may apply to Deaf people, and how effective they are in addressing their inequalities. The findings of this analysis are that the instruments examined are not effective, and sign language recognition is proposed as a solution. The conclusion reached is that sign language recognition proffers a transformative approach to the Deaf Legal Dilemma and should – at least in the long term – give Deaf people ‘equal and inalienable rights’ on par with hearing people, in full cognisance of their status as Sign Language Peoples.

Thesis

You can access my thesis here.

Popular posts from this blog

Welcome

Welcome to my new blog.   It has been some time since I blogged, but as an academic it is obviously important that I write as much as possible.  While the focus will be on academic pieces of work such as journal articles, book chapters, a monograph or manuscripts, the general consensus within the academic community is that any writing is good, and this blog is a way for me to: keep writing/putting my thoughts into something more concrete, to disseminate ideas in the hope that I will receive feedback via the comments, and in the process updating visitors to my website on my current research projects and initiatives. Check back regularly for updates, and if you would like to make any suggestions or work with me, please get in touch on email WilksR2@cardiff.ac.uk , via Twitter ( @rwilks ), or LinkedIN .

The BDA's BSL Audit: what should do the Welsh Government do next?

The British Deaf Association (BDA)  published its audit of the Welsh Government's policies and approaches against the five commitments of their BSL Charter  on 14 February 2023. The BDA recommends the following: A BSL Act in Wales giving sign language communities and Deaf people full citizenship in cultural, social and political contexts; Restructure Deaf education with a national BSL plan; Ensure hearing people and families of Deaf children can learn BSL; Put BSL/English interpreting on a statutory footing; To establish a BSL working group;  Collect statistics relating to the socio-economic situation of BSL users; and Create a Facebook group to gather evidence from the Deaf community. The ball is now in the Welsh Government's court. Progress has already been made with the appointment of a Disability and BSL Policy Manager in Government, who is tasked with implementing the BDA's recommendations. In terms of next steps, while the Government has made clear that the Disability

Deaf legal theory

The DLT Method Deaf legal theory is a somewhat new concept in legal jurisprudence. It was coined by Bryan and Emery in a chapter in Deaf Gain: Raising the Stakes for Human Diversity , published in 2014. I first came across this theory when working on my PhD thesis , and although it only had a minor mention in the end, I had the pleasure of teaching legal jurisprudence at the University of South Wales in 2014 and 2016, and was resolved to delve into deaf legal theory in more detail at some point in the future. Fast forward to 2022, after moving to Cardiff University, the time was ripe to start delving. I created a Developing Deaf Legal Theory blog and started writing blog posts, and lo and behold within two months was invited to give a talk at the University of Birmingham’s Language and Law seminar series about deaf legal theory. I have subsequently been asked to write three entries on deaf legal theory plus case studies for a forthcoming Encyclopaedia of Language and Law. The dea