December 17, 2021 - John Lee Clark is a second-generation Deafblind. He was born in St. Paul and grew up mainly in the western suburb of Eden Prairie. He attended Como Lake Elementary School, where the first bilingual program in Minnesota was established. He later transferred to Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf (MSAD) for his sixth-grade year, where he graduated in 1997. He enrolled at Gallaudet University upon graduation, but he left after only three semesters. Later, John took some classes at the University of Minnesota, “but I realized a traditional university was not the place to gain an education. I did eventually grab two degrees—a bachelor's degree and a master of fine arts degree.” John points out that “but it doesn’t mean I received training at those schools, whose names are written on my degrees. It means I found a way to steal those degrees!”
John’s real education has always been through the community. “For example, Adrean and I set up a small press in 2001, and our magazine and book publishing operations attracted a community of writers. It was through editing the magazine, writing for our weekly e-zine, and talking with our contributors that I learned how to be a writer. Just one example. I never took a class in creative writing.”
Besides writing, John’s current responsibilities include being a core team member of the DeafBlind Interpreting National Training and Resource Center at Western Oregon University, where he is a Protactile educator for their DeafBlind Interpreting Institute. He is also a curriculum developer; ethnographer for a National Science Foundation grant in engineering, for a project developing a Protactile remote communication device; research consultant and director of research activities in the Midwest for another NSF grant, this one in Protactile linguistics, with University of Chicago; and is a 2021-2023 Bush Leadership Fellow. “And did I mention writing?” John quips. He works primarily at home, but his work does take him away on many business trips.
“I am blessed to have been born at the right time, for this moment—the emergence of Protactile!” This means making discoveries and figuring out new ways. I would have been bored to death if there wasn’t a new world to build! At this stage in the Protactile movement, everyone must do everything. Later on, things will advance to where we begin to have specialists. “But right now, everyone does everything. I love that.”
John’s biggest barrier that he faces “is that there are only twenty-four hours in a day!”
But thinking about more regular employment, he adds that a barrier he has noted “ is how most places just hire one person at a time. They hire individuals. What I really want is for them to hire environments, not individuals. For example, hire three of us together to work there. That would be powerful, and we three would be much more successful in our work and affecting the whole workplace than if I was the only DeafBlind person there.”
He questions the following advice he shares: “I am not sure my advice is safe because it is ‘Better starve doing what you love than…’ You get what I mean. I’m not the right person to ask for job-related advice!”
John doesn’t have hobbies “because, as a writer, I already do what I love. Every minute I can spare goes into my writing.” He also points out that he has no use for vacations “because my work is like being on vacation all the time. I don’t understand people who have a job and then they have a hobby.”
The #CanDoAnything campaign showcases people who are deaf, deafblind, or hard of hearing at work, giving them an opportunity to share what they do at their jobs and explain how communication access works for them. This campaign shows what our community can do, which is anything!
