Deaf people at work: assessment of communication among deaf and hearing persons in work settings

This paper focuses on the assessment of communication among deaf and hearing persons within work settings. The paper is organized into two sections. In the first section, findings are presented from an ethnographic study of deaf professionals who have achieved relative success in their employment. The results from this study provide the foundation for a model of communication in work settings, presented in the second section of the paper. This model uses an ecological approach, focusing on assessment of communication at the individual level as it occurs within the broader context of organizational culture, influenced by national trends regarding legal rights, technological advances, and social awareness/attitudes towards deafness.