“Marita is hard of hearing too. She understands more”: Linguistic care work among immigrant deaf and hard of hearing students and teachers

Drawing on Crip Linguistics, disability justice and epistemic justice in educational contexts, we present how linguistic care is enacted between students and teachers in adult education for immigrant deaf and hard of hearing students in Sweden. The aim is to explore teaching and learning practices as examples of linguistic care work and discuss transformative acts of solidarity in networks of teachers and students. In this research project, a linguistic ethnographic study was used to describe lived experience and everyday life in classroom engagement. Neoliberal market emphasize on ‘language as skill’ learning starkly contrasts with relational conditions in learning a new language, where embodied communication, technology, signed and spoken language, and visual resources are utilized. Crip time regarding languaging (patience, material conditions and optimal environments, provision of resources, utilizing all linguistic resources) as well as showing solidarity through the witnessing of being marginalized is described as aspects of linguistic care work.