■“Impaired Hearing” vs. “Deaf”

The incident I’m about to describe happened some time ago, when I was on my way to Kita Kyushu in southern Japan. I usually fly with Japan Air Lines to get frequent flyer points but on this trip I had ended up with Starflyer, which was then one of the new entrants into the Japanese airline business.

(When I first heard of Star Flyer, I pictured someone frying stars. I’m not alone in mixing up “flyer” with “fryer.”*)

When I had my boarding pass issued at the Starflyer check-in counter, I saw a clerk writing down, “Excuse me madam, but your hearing . . .” In an instant I jotted down for her, “Yes, I am a Deaf person.” The clerk’s look told me it was the first time she had seen the word “Deaf” actually used. Then she pointed to one of her ears as if to say, “So your hearing’s impaired, right?”

This exchange brought it home to me that Deaf is still not a familiar word to many people.

In Japanese, some people mistake the Deaf for wax figures or elderly people, because all these words start with the sound “roh.” What is worse, the Federation of the Deaf is sometimes confused with “federation of the elderly,” “wax product association” or even “church for the elderly,” since the Japanese word for association sounds exactly the same as church.

I’m not singling out Star Flyer. It is common for all airlines to regard the Deaf as “people with impaired hearing.” They serve us while clinging on to the negative perception that the Deaf are “people with hearing difficulties.” I suppose it never occurs to them that there is a group of people whose first language is sign language.

Special assistance service pages on airline websites speak volumes for this perception: The JAL web page states that writing pads are available onboard for passengers who have difficulty hearing and speaking.

Another example: The All Nippon Airways (ANA) special assistance web page says, “Please indicate the following when booking flights: Are you accompanied by a guide dog?” They say they need to know in advance if passengers have difficulty in hearing so that they can be prepared to communicate in the event of an emergency.”

To my surprise, Star Flyer narrowly passes the test in this regard: “For passengers with a guide dog/partner dog: You may let him/her on board free of charge. Please advise us about your dog at the time of booking”.

In their references to guide dogs, the ANA and JAL pages start with “For those with hearing difficulties,” while Star Flyer begins by saying “For those with guide dogs.”

The difference means a lot more to us than it sounds.

Why can’t they use phrases like “those who communicate with sign language,” “those who use hearing aids,” or “those with guide dogs” instead of referring to customers’ hearing abilities?

There is another episode relating to air travel. At the end of check-in procedures I always hear the same phrase trotted out by airlines: “Is there anything else you need, madam?” I guess that’s one of the stock phrases listed in their customer service manuals.

So the other day, I was only joking when I said, “What services are there?” To which I received the reply: “Priority boarding, Braille magazines and so on.” Exactly as specified in their manual, I assume.

Service according to a manual is not a big deal. What matters for people in the service sector, just like for translators, is to provide appropriate services depending on the situation and on whom they’re dealing with. It’s a pity not many of them are aware of that.

*Translated from the e-magazine of April 9, 2007 (# 080)

*Since Japanese doesn’t have a katakana character (showing phonetic spelling) to represent the letter “l,” we use the character for “r” to represent the “l” sound. For instance, “fryer” and “flyer” share the same phonetic spelling in Japanese. That’s one of the reasons why Japanese people in general are not good at distinguishing “r” sounds from “l” sounds in English.