Signing for Life: How Deaf Gay Activists Responded to the AIDS Crisis

This piece for Nursing Clio examines the subtle and blatant inequities that deaf people encountered as they addressed AIDS amongst their community during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The experiences of individuals like John Canady illustrate the specific challenges deaf people faced upon receiving an AIDS/HIV diagnosis.

The AIDS epidemic and how deaf people navigated it is a tale of inequality and misunderstanding between deaf/hard of hearing people and the hearing. It is also a story of the pride, memorialization, and resilience of deaf individuals living with AIDS/HIV who preserved their stories through commemorative actions like the NAMES Project AIDS quilt and community memorials.

These deaf organizations should be remembered alongside AIDS groups such as ACT UP, and deaf social movements. Here, this history will be detailed through the stories of activists from San Francisco’s Rainbow Deaf Society (RDS), who were motivated by the tragic story of John Canady and demanded better services for themselves and their community.