BSL:UPTAKE » Blog Archive » Citizenship and the Deaf Community (9.4.6 Future research)

Citizenship and the Deaf Community (9.4.6 Future research)

9.4.6 Future research

Future research conducted into citizenship and the Deaf community could be undertaken to follow up this research. Other research might address the issues outlined in section 9.4. Since citizenship is a contested concept, further ways of exploring Deaf communities in relation to different perspectives might be considered.

Research into the citizenship of the Deaf community is also urgently required. This is suggested on the basis of a number of factors, including the sense in which the Deaf community has changed over the past twenty years, the impact of globalisation allowing Deaf citizens increasingly to communicate across national boundaries, and medical advances that may lead to a reduction in those who use sign language. Globalisation has the potential to bring together Deaf citizens in developing nations with those in western nations, a significant shift given that the vast majority of the worlds Deaf citizens reside in developing countries. This raises the question of the nature of the Deaf community in the twenty-first century. Given these factors, in this country more research would be needed to analyse Deaf people’s sense of self as Deaf and/or British. Such research would have particular contemporary resonance given the ways in which the issues of immigration and asylum seekers have impacted on the UK generally in recent years.