Monica McGee awoke to a perfectly normal day. She said good morning to her parents in their first language: ASL.

People in all walks of life are affected by deaf culture. This possibly unknown culture was highlighted during Deaf Awareness Week. One of the main topics was audism, although the definition of it is not often known

“I was given a definition of audism, but didn’t learn it in class” sophomore ASL student Zach Pate said.

Audism is generally looking down on deaf people. It can mean blocking people from jobs or just general hate towards the deaf. Most of the time, it is unintentional. Audists are people who practice audism.

“I don’t think people think of themselves as audists,” ASL teacher, Monica McGee, said, “but the majority of people think ‘oh that person’s deaf, how could they possibly even do this or that.’”

ASL is the third most used language in the United States. Despite this, audism still is prevalent even if it is not easily spotted.

According to AmandaMagruder the best solution to audism in our society is, “just talking about it, and being open to new ideas, being open to meeting new people including deaf and hard-of-hearing people.”