Subjectivity, Theory of Mind, and the creation of Deaf characters in fiction

This chapter explores how d/Deaf characters are represented in two very different books, Roz Rosen’s Deaf Culture Fairy Tales (2017), retold stories ideologically positioned within Deaf Culture, and Antony John’s YA novel Five Flavors of Dumb (2010), whose post-lingually deaf first person narrator embodies deaf experience as immersed in the hearing world but without any contact with Deaf Culture. The fictive characterization of complex deaf characters is brought about by the interaction of multiple cognitive processes, which include Theory of Mind and cognitive mapping, within a social ecology. Because Deaf Culture Fairy Tales is grounded in Deaf-centric epistemology (members of Deaf Culture establish a truth based on their cultural beliefs and experiences), the two books are largely ideologically incompatible, since Five Flavors of Dumb is firmly positioned within majority hearing culture. The novel in effect sets aside some major worries of Deaf Culture by representing them in their most successful manifestations.