This study explores the experience of the hearing-impaired person in arts activity from the perspective of
self-government. For the purpose, it looks into a university student's experience in sign-language non-verbal
musical performance with the narrative research approach. The handicap to the disabled proposes not only
physical issues but also cultural issues, that is, undermining their identity, self-efficiency and self-confidence.
Regarding the cultural issues, many researches pay attention to the significance of empowerment and
underlines especially to foster the self-empowerment or psychological empowerment. The study switches the
interest in the empowerment into the self-government in order to focus on the disabled's understanding of
their own experience. By doing so, it examines how they improve their self-governmental ability during the
period they participate in arts activity. As a result, it reveals the experience of arts activity improves the
hearing-impaired person's self-governmental abilities regarding self-expression, mutual relationship, selfunderstanding
and leadership, which are not owned by her before she joined the activity. The study also
shows that the self-government is more effectively fostered in the familiar environments to the disabled. It
suggests that in the education of the disabled, the ‘inclusive education’ is not the only way to improve
their self-governmental ability.