(I think "deafness during the Middle Ages" might be a very niche topic, hence why I'm phrasing my question this way.)
I recently read a fantasy novel set in the 1200s with a deaf character, and I'm very curious about the reality of people living with deafness in the Middle Ages.
However, I'm not sure of the best way to even find books or articles on this topic--a lot of the deaf history books I find on Amazon.com seem to focus on 19th century & later, or specifically American deaf history.
In a more general search I found some article abstracts but seem to be from non-history journals and might seem otherwise sketchy.
I did find a review of a book by Irina Metzler about "disability in the Middle Ages" but I don't know how to evaluate if this book would meet my needs (plus, holy cow, that book is expensive).
I would really just like to find a couple good articles or books on this topic, hopefully relatively recent.
Medieval disability studies is just getting off the ground, so there is not a ton of information out there.
Metzler has written two books on disability history. Disability in Medieval Europe is more of a theological and medical/proto-scientific perspective; A Social History of Disability in the Middle Ages tries to go a bit farther into what it was like for people to live. There isn't a focused section on deafness, but there are some anecdotes. The Kindle version of that book looks somewhat more affordable, but I'm not sure it is worth it if you are interested solely on deafness. Are you in the US? Your public library should be able to get you that book through Interlibrary Loan as well, although it might take some time.
Teresa de Cartagena was a 15th century nun who went deaf during her lifetime due to illness. Her writings include some reflection on that. Excerpts are available in somewhat-affordable English translation.
There are a few book chapters on Chaucer's Wife of Bath, who is partially deaf (a status which carried significant theological meaning in the Middle Ages, exemplified by the asp that presses one ear to the ground so it cannot hear the teachings of the Church...but Chaucer is more nimble than that).
Woo, a question in my flaired content area! So happy to see someone with this interest!
As you noted, Metzler's book does cover deafness; you may be able to get it via interlibrary loan. Another source is the essay "Images of the Deaf in Medieval Western Europe" by Aude de Saint-Loupe, which is in Looking Back edited by Renate Fischer and Harlan Lane.
Unfortunately, that's all the English-language material I'm aware of on the subject. It's likely some has been published in Europe, though. The reason most of what you find is from later eras is because that's when we have documentation from. It's not that you're not finding it as a casual reader, it's that researchers haven't found much documentation to publish from. What we have mostly starts in the 1500s, with Pedro Ponce de Leon, a Spanish monk who founded a school for deaf children. Before that, there just isn't much out there.