The University of Minnesota Duluth has announced it has cut the Deaf Studies Program effective immediately. The result is that students in the Deaf Studies Minor will be unable to finish their minor classes at UMD, and they will need to receive instruction elsewhere. Students at UMD will be stripped of the privilege of learning the beauty that is Deaf Culture, Deaf History, or ASL linguistics, and the space where so many ASL students and Deaf community members go to practice their signing, the ASL lab, will be no more. This language, culture, and community mean SO MUCH to SO MANY PEOPLE. 

Although we use our hands to speak, this department will not go silently.

We will fight for our right to stay and teach at this university. Not just for the students, but for representation, cultural diversity, and belonging that this program brings to so many. 

This cut has removed our Deaf faculty—individuals who have lived and embodied this culture and language. By excluding them from teaching their own culture, we are further marginalizing an already oppressed group. This is oppression at its finest, and supporting the action of removing DEI from institutions.