Cochlear implants are considered the gold standard in intervening on deafness and hearing loss. However, “success” is predicated upon routine and consistent use, which in turn is predicated on the ability to maintain devices. This essay considers what happens when use is partial and precarious and asks what happens when external implant processors become obsolete. Contributing to Science and Technology Studies scholarship on obsolescence and the binary between use and nonuse, I analyzes the ongoing aftermath of a central government program in India that provides children living below the poverty line with cochlear implants. Drawing on ethnography and interviews, the article analyzes how families struggle financially and logistically to maintain devices, resulting in cycles of partial use and precarious use. Ultimately, devices become obsolete, and families cannot afford compulsory upgrades. The state and corporations claim these families abandon the devices. In contrast to this claim, the article stresses that we must examine abandonment differently, by attending to how families are abandoned by the state and corporations. Arguing that obsolescence as a concept obscures relationality and functions apolitically, the concept of abandonment is instead put forward to analyze ruptures that occur when consistent and reliable biotechnology use is no longer possible.
AhmedSara. 2019. What’s the Use? On the Uses of Use. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
2.
AlperMeryl. 2017. Giving Voice: Mobile Communication, Disability, and Inequality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
3.
BahanBenjamin. 2014. “Senses and Culture: Exploring Sensory Orientations.” In Deaf Gain: Raising the Stakes for Human Diversity, edited by BaumanH-Dirksen L.MurrayJoseph J., 233–54. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
4.
BaradKaren. 2007. Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Objects and Meaning. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
5.
BatesonGregory. 1972. Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
6.
BaumanH-Dirksen L. 2004. “Audism: Exploring the Metaphysis of Oppression.” Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education9 (2): 239–46.
7.
BaumerEric P. S.AmesMorgan G.BrubakerJed R.BurrellJennaDourishPaul. 2014. “Refusing, Limiting, Departing: Why We Should Study Technology Non-use.” In CHI ‘14 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 65–68. New York: Association for Computing Machinery. doi:10.1145/2559206.2559224.
8.
BenjaminRuha. 2019. Race after Technology. New York: Polity Books.
9.
BennettCynthia L.2020. “Towards Centering Access in Professional Design”. PhD diss., University of Washington, Seattle.
10.
BennettCynthia L.RosnerDaniela K.. 2019. “The Promise of Empathy: Design, Disability, and Knowing the ‘Other.’” In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 1–13. New York: Association for Computing Machinery. doi:10.1145/3290605.3300528.
ChibArulAngMing WeiIbascoGabrielle C.NguyenHoan. 2021. “Mobile Media (Non-)Use as Expression of Agency.” Mass Communication and Society24 (6): 818–42. doi:10.1080/15205436.2021.1970187.
13.
EspinosaMonicaDanNathan-Roberts. (2019). “Understanding Prosthetic Abandonment.” Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting63 (1): 1644–1648. https://doi.org/10.1177/1071181319631508.
14.
FriednerMicheleBlockPamela. 2023. “Recuperating the Bad Outcome: Reimagining Optimal Futures beyond Auditory Verbal Therapy and Applied Behavioral Analysis.” The Senses and Society18(1): 34–51.
15.
FriednerMichele Ilana. 2022. Sensory Futures: Deafness and Cochlear Implant Infrastructures in India. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
HarawayDonna. 1988. “Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective.” Feminist Studies14 (3): 575–99.
21.
HockingClare. 1999. “Function or Feelings: Factors in Abandonment of Assistive Devices.” Technology and Disability11 (1-2): 3–11. doi:10.3233/TAD-1999-111-202.
22.
KaferAlison. 2013. Feminist Queer Crip. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
23.
LaneHarlan. 1999. The Mask of Benevolence: Disabling the Deaf Community. San Diego, CA: Dawn Sign Press.
24.
LloydStephanieBonventreChani. 2020. “When the Artificial Is Natural: Reconsidering What Bionics and Sensoria Do.” Ethos48(3): 295–316. doi:10.1111/etho.12285.
MauldinLaura. 2014. “Precarious Plasticity: Neuropolitics, Cochlear Implants, and the Redefinition of Deafness.” Science, Technology, & Human Values39 (1): 130–53.
27.
MauldinLaura. 2016. Made to Hear. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
28.
MehrotraRohitPankaj SrivastavAnubhawSharmaRudresh. 2020. “A Study of Outcomes Following Cochlear Implantation in Children under Adip Scheme—An Indian Experience.” Online Journal of Otolaryngology and Rhinology2 (4): 1–7.
29.
MellalMohamed Arezki. 2020. “Obsolescence—A Review of the Literature.” Technology in Society63:101347. doi:10.1016/j.techsoc.2020.101347.
MillsMara. 2012. “Do Signals Have Politics? Inscribing Abilities in Cochlear Implants.” In The Oxford Handbook of Sound Studies, edited by PinchTrevorBijsterveldKarin, 320–46. New York: Oxford University Press.
32.
PerzanowskiAaron. 2021. The Right to Repair: Reclaiming the Things We Own Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
33.
PetrieHelenCarmienStefanLewisAndrew. 2018. “Assistive Technology Abandonment: Research Realities and Potentials.” In Computers Helping People with Special Needs, edited by MiesenbergerKlausKouroupetroglouGeorgios, 532–40. Berlin, Germany: Springer. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-94274-2_77.
SinghShomeshwarVashistShashankAriyaratneThathya V.. 2015. “One-year Experience with the CochlearTM Paediatric Implanted Recipient Observational Study (Cochlear P-IROS) in New Delhi, India.” Journal of Otology10 (2): 57–65. doi:10.1016/j.joto.2015.09.002.
40.
StricklandElizaHarrisMark. 2022. “Their Bionic Eyes Are Now Obsolete and Unsupported.” IEEE Spectrum, February 15. Accessed January 11, 2023. https://spectrum.ieee.org/bionic-eye-obsolete.
41.
WaldmanMichael. 1993. “A New Perspective on Planned Obsolescence.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics108 (1): 273–83. doi:10.2307/2118504.
42.
Watts BelserJulia. 2016. “Vital Wheels: Disability, Relationality, and the Queer Animacy of Vibrant Things.” Hypatia31 (1): 5–21.
43.
World Health Organization. 2008. Guidelines on the Provision of Manual Wheelchairs in Less Resourced Settings. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization.
44.
World Health Organization. 2019. Preferred Profile for Hearing-aid Technology Suitable for Low- and Middle-income Countries. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization.
45.
WyattSally. 2005. “Non-users also Matter: The Construction of Users and Non-users of the Internet.” In How Users Matter: The Co-construction of Users and Technology, edited by OudshoornNellyPinchTrevor, 67–80. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
46.
WyattSallyThomasGrahamTerranovaTiziana. 2002. “They Came, They Surfed, They Went Back to the Beach: Conceptualising Use and Non-use of the Internet”. In Virtual Society? Technology, Cyberpole, Reality, edited by WoolgarS., 23–40. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
47.
YmousAnonSpielKattaKeyesOsWilliamsRua M.GoodJudithHorneckerEvaBennettCynthia L.. 2020. “‘I Am Just Terrified of My Future’—Epistemic Violence in Disability Related Technology Research.” In Extended Abstracts of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 1–16. New York: Association for Computing Machinery. doi:10.1145/3334480.3381828.
48.
ZengFan-GangRebscherStephenHarrisonWilliamSunXiaoanFengHaihong. 2008. “Cochlear Implants: System Design, Integration, and Evaluation.” IEEE Reviews in Biomedical Engineering1: 115–42. doi:10.1109/RBME.2008.2008250.
