The Social Integration of Veterans with Military-Induced Hearing Loss Post-1918

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Veterans have been the focus of increasing interest in both history and literary studies, yet so far studies have predominantly focused on physical disabilities and PTSD and have largely concentrated on America. Research has yet to be conducted on the experiences of veterans with military-induced hearing loss in Britain post-1918, despite the fact that at least 2.4% of the British army sustained hearing loss during WWI to a disabling level. However, the majority of cases went unreported due to the widespread attitude of British doctors viewing these soldiers as 'malingerers' (Conroy and Malik, 2018), and therefore the number may well be higher. This research will explore contemporary attitudes of medical professionals; reactions of the British public towards veterans with hearing loss; the representations of those veterans in the British media; and government policy towards those veterans, asking how these factors contributed to the negative and arduous experiences of WWI veterans with military-induced hearing loss. More broadly, it will improve contemporary understandings and representations of disabled veterans, provide a new insight into post-war ideas about disability, and make important contributions to veteran studies, war and conflict, disability, and the medical humanities.This research will address the following questions: How did government legislation affect veterans with hearing loss differently to those with visible disabilities?Was there a link between veterans with military-induced hearing loss and mental health illnesses?Did misconceptions of deafness prior to 1918 affect the perception of veterans with hearing loss? What was the role of the media in forming the British public's perception of disabled veterans? Was hearing loss a unique and unusual experience of post war disability, and if so, why?The research will consider how misconceptions of deafness led to undiagnosed and underreported cases of military-induced hearing loss, and how the media's portrayal of disabled people as socially flawed and abnormal (Barnes, 1992) reinforced the stigma of disabilities like hearing loss. Deaf activists have promoted the idea of a disabling community, arguing that it is society which isolates those with hearing loss, alienating them, and substantiating their disabled identity (Foster, 1989). My analysis will be informed by the scholarship of Davis (1995) and Ladd (2003) both of whom challenged the social and medical discourse on Deaf culture and promoted a bigger movement for disabled rights. This links to concepts of social justice, an area that is increasingly prevalent in the current literature. Mladenov (2016) argues for the importance of the perspective of disability in understanding and promoting social justice. This thesis will therefore discuss the medicalisation of deafness and its impact on the veterans integrating back into society.