Built by a CODA. Built on agape.
The story behind the organization, the family behind the name, and the conviction behind the work.
CODA · Amazon Bestselling Author · National Keynote Speaker · 2023 Remarkable Woman of Charlotte · 2024 Stevie Award Winner
Two worlds. One pair of hands.
Starr Clinton grew up holding both worlds in her hands before she had words for either. Daughter of a Deaf mother. Granddaughter of the woman who told her to build it. CODA, the child of Deaf adults, before she knew the word for what she was.
The Deaf world raised her. The hearing world taught her. Somewhere between the two, she learned the cost of a gap that nobody had built a bridge across. Family conversations interpreted by a child. Doctors talked over instead of talked to. Strangers asked her mother questions, then turned to a young Starr to wait for the answer.
Starr did not start Nita's Silent Hands because someone funded the idea. She started it because she lived inside the gap her entire life and refused to leave it standing for the next generation.
The name is the thank you. Chinita. Juanita. The two women whose lives are the reason any of this exists. Nita's Silent Hands is theirs first. Everyone else stands on what they built.
Chinita and Juanita.
Two women. One Deaf. One hearing. One mother. One grandmother. The two names on the door of Nita's Silent Hands belong to the women who made the organization possible long before it had a name.
Chinita is Starr's mother. Deaf. The woman who raised her daughter inside a world that was rarely built for either of them and did it anyway. With grace. With grit. With a quiet authority that filled every room she walked into. The Deaf community Starr knows, the language she carries, the cultural fluency she brings to every conversation, all of it traces back to Chinita.
Juanita is Starr's grandmother. Hearing. The woman who told Starr to go after the dream. To build the thing she was being called to build. Juanita did not see the gap from inside the way Chinita did, but she saw her granddaughter and she knew. She gave the push that turned a calling into a commitment.
Nita's Silent Hands carries both names because the work would not exist without both of them. One taught Starr the world the organization serves. The other told her to build it. The bridge NSH builds between Deaf and hearing communities is not only the mission. It is the lineage the organization comes from.
The name is the foundation. Everyone else stands on what they built.
The lifetime achievement of Nita's Silent Hands.
The Nita Award is the highest honor Nita's Silent Hands gives. Presented annually at the Deaf Culture Experience Premiere Gala, it recognizes a Deaf, hard of hearing, or CODA woman whose life embodies the four qualities the name itself was built on. Resilience. Grace. Elegance. Beloved.
The first Nita Award goes to Chinita. Starr's mother. The woman whose name the organization carries. Every recipient after her stands in the lineage Chinita opened.
Resilience.
Carrying hard things with grace and moving forward without losing yourself.
Grace.
Dignity in all circumstances. Warmth in all relationships.
Elegance.
Self-possession expressed outward. Knowing your worth and presenting it without apology.
Beloved.
The rare gift of making every person in the room feel seen, valued, and held.
Nita's Silent Hands does not advocate from a distance. We build from the inside.
A method. Four programs. One mission.
Nita's Silent Hands runs on the GEAR method. Give. Educate. Awareness. Resources. Four commitments that turn the love behind the work into a system that scales.
The programs follow the method. ASL Education brings language across the bridge. Hands of Unity funds the work that does not stop between events. Youth Empowerment puts Deaf youth at the center of the room they have always belonged in. Deaf Culture Awareness changes how the hearing world sees the community Nita's Silent Hands stands with.
Give monthly.
Recurring support that funds the work between events. Hands of Unity is the family that keeps the bridge standing.
Join Hands of UnityRead the method.
The proprietary framework behind every Nita's Silent Hands program. Built to scale. Built to last. Built on agape.
Explore the MethodReach the team.
Press, board prospects, partnership inquiries, or program requests. Every conversation starts with a message.
Contact NSH