Sonnenstrahl to be JDC Convention Keynote Speaker

Jewish Deaf Congress (JDC), has announced that the new keynote speaker during the JDC convention in Universal City, CA on Wednesday, August 12th is Dr. Debbie Sonnenstrahl, who retired from Gallaudet University as professor emeritus in 1996 after 32 years. Born Deaf to a hearing family in Baltimore, MD, Sonnenstrahl attended a Catholic school for the Deaf in the 1940’s when no Jewish or even public school for deaf pre-schoolers was available in the Baltimore area. She first learned sign language when she was 17 and had enrolled at Gallaudet, earning her Bachelors degree in 1958. Since then she has gone on to obtain her Masters degree in Art History from Catholic University in 1965 and a doctorate in Museum Studies and Deafness Education from New York University in 1987. She is very active in museum accessibility and showcasing Deaf Artists’ contributions, sewed on several museum advisory committees including the Smithsonian and American Association of Museums, given presentations on Deaf artists and museum accessibility and is now working on a book about American Deaf Artists from 1760 to the present. She is mother of two Deaf children and four Deaf grandchildren.