Deaf Friendly Pub Ramps it up for Fringe - The Duke of Brunswick Hotel

Adelaide’s First Deaf Friendly Pub Ramps it up for Fringe

Adelaide’s First Deaf Friendly Pub ramps it up for Fringe

13 January, 2020 

Deaf Deaf Can:Do, the Royal South Australian Deaf Society, has provided qualified and professional interpreters to facilitate effective communication between Deaf and hearing people for decades. For the first time, a venue, the Duke of Brunswick is partnering with Deaf Can:Do, and is championing accessibility to the Deaf community to become Adelaide’s first Deaf friendly pub.

The upcoming Adelaide Fringe season will launch the pub’s initiative; a first for a Fringe venue, every Adelaide Fringe show at the Duke of Brunswick will be accessible to the Deaf community. Deaf Can:Do supporter Flight Centre South Australia heard about this commitment and is donating 100% of the funds needed to cover the cost of the interpreting services. In addition, Deaf Can:Do is facilitating Auslan (Australian Sign Language) training to Duke of Brunswick staff, giving them the skills to be able to communicate with Deaf people in their own language..

“There are many people with language barriers who aren’t able to access things in the community that they should be able to access,” says Debbie Kennewell, Deaf Can:Do General Manager.

Approximately 950 people across South Australia use Auslan (Australian Sign Language) as their primary method of communication (Census, 2017) with a growing number of people becoming interested in learning the language for a range of reasons.

“The outcome of partnerships like these is that gradually society will become more inclusive of our Deaf Community.”

Flight Centre South Australia are big supporters of Deaf Can:Do and are proud to be involved.

“When we heard about what Deaf Can:Do and Duke of Brunswick wanted to achieve, we had to be part of it,” says  Flight Centre State Marketing Manager, Felicity Allan.

“No one should have to feel isolated and excluded from social activities like going to Fringe show and ordering a drink because of a language barrier.”

The Duke of Brunswick, which is already well known as Adelaide’s first 100% gluten free pub, having championed a number of community initiatives under their “Seriously Social” moniker, is over the moon to have this initiative as an Adelaide Fringe first.

“Our front of house and management team have given up their Sundays to learn a new language so we can communicate with our patrons from the Deaf community, it has been a fantastic experience for the team and our customers and we are glad to have another first to our name as Adelaide’s first Deaf friendly pub,” says Simone Douglas, Publican at the Duke of Brunswick.

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Simone Douglas

Simone Douglas

Simone is co-founder and Senior Principal Solutions Architect of Social Media AOK. Simone offers over 17 years in corporate management roles encompassing generalist HR recruitment and development of small to large teams across multiple sites, industry sectors and states. Experienced in a variety of social media platforms and their complimentary applications, social media strategy, risk management, disaster recovery and associated HR policies and processes.

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