The People of the Eye: Deaf Ethnicity and Ancestry (2 page)

We have not conducted a survey. Generalizations about ethnic groups are rarely based on experimental or survey findings. If we claim that the French love food, for example, it is not because we asked a sample of French men and women if they do, but rather because a score of facts fit together (long preparation of foods, abundance of restaurants, daily shopping for food, numerous books about food, etc.). And when we say that the French love food we do not mean that all French people love food, of course, but rather that it is a trait of French culture. There are undoubtedly some French men and women who do not care about food (we know one) but that does not invalidate the claim.8 Similarly, there may well be some ASL signers who view themselves as, say, hearing-impaired but that alone will not invalidate the claim that Deaf culture does not take that view. Thus when we claim below that Deaf-World values are like this and Deaf-World customs like that, and other such generalizations, if you find yourself thinking "It's more complex than that"-we agree, it is. Our purpose here is to capture some of the main features of the Deaf-World, its central tendencies, in order to evaluate whether it is an ethnic group.

In Part I of this book, we examine the fit of the concept of "ethnic group" to the structure of the Deaf-World. ASL signers have been contending for nearly a half century that they are a linguistic and cultural minority, and there is extensive scholarship to support that view. Are they also an ethnic group? Deaf and hearing scholars have raised the issue from time to time over several decades; an inventory of early use of the concept of Deaf ethnicity is in the endnotes.9 This book is, however, the first extended examination of ethnicity and the DeafWorld.

A central issue in ethnicity is ancestry. Parts II, III, and IV report our results in tracing Deaf-World ancestry in three places in New England that were key in the founding of the Deaf-World-southern New Hampshire, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, and southern Maine. We have focused on the nineteenth and earlier centuries since we are interested in the founders and founding of the Deaf-World. In this decade-long research, we have made a start on describing some of the people, themes and forces in the lives of Deaf founders. We offer these findings and analyses to Deaf and to hearing people, to scholars, and laymen, in the hope that they will assist them in achieving their goals and inspire them to provide for these and other Deaf families a fuller account of what it was to be Deaf and how the language, culture, and social structure of the Deaf-World came about. Deaf ancestry and the lives of the founders are a part of Deaf heritage and it is gratifying to enrich what is known of that history. But there is another and broader reward in store for the thoughtful reader. Deaf people have come together in this nation from its earliest times. They give us insights into the foundations of language, culture, and society.

Notes

Introduction

1 R. E. Mitchell, T. A. Young, B. Bachleda, and M. A. Karchmer, "How Many People Use ASL in the United States? Why Estimates Need Updating," Sign Language Studies 6 (2007): 306-335. "In other words, we may wish to inflate the previous estimate to not more than 500,000 people who were signing at home in 1972," quotation from p. 323. ASL use would be fewer. See Note 1; C. Padden and T. Humphries, Inside Deaf Culture (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2005), p. 9: 100-300,000 ASL signers; J. D. Schein, At Home Among Strangers (Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet University Press, 1989).

2 A person who produces messages in English is called an English speaker. On that model, we should refer to ASL speakers; we have not done so only to avoid distracting those readers who are new to Deaf studies. On population estimates, see: R. E. Mitchell, "How Many Deaf People Are There in the United States? Estimates From the Survey of Income and Program Participation," Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 11 (2006): 112-119; C. Binnie, "The Future Of Audiologic Rehabilitation: Overview And Forecast," in Research in Audiological Rehabilitation, J. P. Gagne and N. Tye-Murray, eds. (Cedar Falls, Iowa: American Academy of Rehabilitative Audiology, 1994), 13-24.

3 B. Bahan, "Memoir Upon the Formation of a Visual Variety of the Human Race," in B. K. Eldredge, D. Stringham, and M. Wilding-Diaz, eds., Deaf Studies Today (Orem, Utah: Utah Valley State College, 2005),17-35; C. Padden and T. Humphries, Deaf in America: Voices from a Culture (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1988); "For they are first, last, and all the time the people of the eye." George Veditz, "The President's Message," Ninth Convention Of The National Association and the Third World's Congress of the Deaf, August 6-13, 1910 (Philadelphia, Pa.: Philocophus Press, 1912), quotation from p. 30.

a This contrast is often expressed in the scholarly literature by the use of capital-D Deaf for those who use a sign language primarily and small-d deaf for members of the larger group who do not, following a convention first proposed by James Woodward in 1972. J. Woodward, How You Gonna Get to Heaven If You Can't Talk to Jesus? On Depathologizing Deafness (Silver Spring, Md.: TJ Publishers, 1982).

5 J. Fernandes and S. Myers, "Deaf Studies: Barriers and Pathways," Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 15 (2010), 17-29. S Myers and J. Fernandes, "Deaf Studies: A Critique of the Predominant U.S. Theoretical Direction," Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 15 (2010), 30-49.

6 C. Padden, "From The Cultural To The Bicultural: The Modern Deaf Community," in I. Parasnis, ed., Cultural and Language Diversity: Reflections on the Deaf Experience (Cambridge, Mass.: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 79-98. See also: C. Padden, "The Culture of Deaf People," in C. Baker and R. Battison, eds., Sign Language and the Deaf Community, Essays in Honor of William Stokoe (Silver Spring, Md.: National Association of the Deaf, 1980), 89-103.

7 R. E. Mitchell and M. Karchmer, "Chasing the Mythical Ten Percent: Parental Hearing Status of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students in the United States," Sign Language Studies 4 (2004): 138-163.

s For a study of Deaf ethnicity using survey data, see R. Eckert, Deafnicity: A Study of Strategic and Adaptive Responses to Audism by Members of the Deaf American Community of Culture. (Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 2005); R. Eckert, "Toward a Theory of Deaf Ethnos: Deafnicity = D/deaf (Homaemon · Homoglosson · Homothreskon)," Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 15 (2010): 317-333.

9 The concept of Deaf ethnicity was first explored in the United States in articles and chapters by (alphabetically): C. Erting, "Language Policy and Deaf Ethnicity in the United States," Sign Language Studies 19 (1978): 139-152; C. Erting, "Deafness, Communication And Social Identity: An Anthropological Analysis of Interaction among Parents, Teachers, and Deaf Children in a Pre-School" (Ph.D. diss., American University, 1982); C. Padden and H. Markowicz, "Crossing Cultural Group Boundaries into the Deaf Community" (paper delivered at the Conference on Culture and Communication, Temple University, Philadelphia, 1975.); T. Humphries, "An Introduction to the Culture of Deaf People in the United States: Content Notes and Reference Material for Teachers," Sign Language Studies 72 (1991) 209-240; R. E. Johnson and C. Erting, "Sign, Solidarity, and Socialization" (paper presented at a meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Cincinnati, Ohio, 1979); R. E. Johnson and C. Erting. "Linguistic Socialization in the Context of Emergent Deaf Ethnicity" in C. Erting and R. Meisegeier, eds., working paper No. 1: Deaf Children and the Socialization Process (Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet College Sociology Department, 1982); R. E. Johnson and C. Erting, "Linguistic Socialization in the Context of Emergent Deaf Ethnicity," in K. Kernan, ed., Wenner-Gren Working Papers in Anthropology (New York: Wenner-Gren, 1984); R. E. Johnson and C. Erting, "Ethnicity and Socialization in a Classroom for Deaf Children" in C. Lucas, ed., The Sociolinguistics of the Deaf Community (New York: Academic Press, 1989), 41-84; H. Markowicz and J. Woodward, "Language and the Maintenance of Ethnic Boundaries in the Deaf Community" (paper presented at the Conference on Culture and Communication, Philadelphia, 1975); H. Markowicz, "La Langue des Signes et l'Education des Sourds: Une Perspective Sociolinguistique" (Memoire de Diplome d'Etudes Approfondies, U.E.R. de Linguistique, Universite de Paris V,1989-1990); H. Markowicz and J. Woodward, "Language and the Maintenance of Ethnic Boundaries in the Deaf Community," Communication and Cognition 2 (1978):29-37; H. Markowicz, "La Communaute des Sourds en tant que Minorite Linguistique," Coup d'ceil 1980 (suppl.): 1-12; B. Mottez and H. Markowicz, Integration on Droit a la Difference, les Consequences d'un Choix Politique sur la Structuration et le Mode d'Existence d'un Groupe Minoritaire, les Sourds (Paris: Centre d'Etude des Mouvements Sociaux); Padden, "Culture Of Deaf People"; Padden and Humphries, Deaf in America.; C. Padden and H. Markowicz, "Cultural Conflicts between Hearing and Deaf Communities," in F. B. Crammatte and A. B. Crammatte, eds., VII World Congress of the World Federation of the Deaf. (Silver Spring, Md.: National Association of the Deaf, 1976), 407-411; J. Woodward and H. Markowicz, "Some Handy New Ideas on Pidgins and Creoles: Pidgin Sign Languages" (paper presented at the International Conference on Pidgins and Creoles, Honolulu, 1975); J. Woodward, "How You Gonna Get to Heaven if You Can't Talk with Jesus: The Educational Establishment vs. the Deaf Community" (paper presented at the International Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology, Amsterdam, 1975); J. Woodward, "How You Gonna Get to Heaven if You Can't Talk With Jesus: The Educational Establishment vs. the Deaf Community," In J. Woodward, ed., How You Gonna Get to Heaven if You Can't Talk With Jesus: On Depathologizing Deafness (Silver Spring, Md.: T.J. Publishers, 1982),11-19.

By date:

1975: Padden and Markowicz, "Crossing Cultural Group Boundaries"; Markowicz and Woodward, "Language and Ethnic Boundaries"; Woodward and Markowicz, "Handy New Ideas"; Woodward, "How You Gonna Get to Heaven." 1976: Padden and Markowicz, "Cultural Conflicts"; 1978: Erting, "Language Policy"; 1978: Markowicz and Woodward, "Ethnic Boundaries"; 1979: Johnson and Erting, "Sign, Solidarity"; 1979: Mottez and Markowicz, Integration; 1980: Baker and Battison, "Sign Language"; 1980: Markowicz, "Communaute des Sourds"; 1982: Erting, "Deafness, Communication"; 1982: Woodward, "Educational Establishment"; 1982: Johnson and Erting, "Linguistic Socialization"; 1984: Johnson and Erting, "Linguistic Socialization" WennerGren. 1988: Padden and Humphries, Deaf in America; 1989: Johnson and Erting, "Ethnicity and Socialization"; 1989: Markowicz, "La Langue des Signes"; 1991: Humphries "Culture of Deaf People."

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Ethnic communities predate the start of written history and they are to be found virtually everywhere today.' The smallest are bands or clans, the largest can encompass one or more countries. Every person is a member of some culturally distinctive group and in that sense we are all ethnic, although majorities frequently reserve the term for minorities whom they disparage.2 There is nothing inherently bad, however, about our ethnic affiliations. On the contrary, ethnic ties are deeply meaningful and strongly felt, rooted in psychology.3 The strength of emotion evoked by ethnicity is reminiscent of that evoked by family ties, and may be based on them; as the aphorism goes, "Ethnicity is family writ large." Like family, ethnicity is woven into the fabric of everyday life and involves shared obligations and traditions. However, ethnicity surpasses family in its scope: it evokes a rich history of one's kind and a historic fate across generations; it entails stereotypes of "us" and "them." It involves distinct values, customs, and myths. These cultural traits are embedded in language and in behavior. In brief, shared culture is the cohesive force in an ethnic group and one that differentiates it from other such groups .4

This cultural perspective on ethnicity only alludes to something important: ethnic groups commonly encounter one another in shared settings and they construct rules to govern those encounters, rules that reinforce cultural differences, maintain boundaries, and sustain ethnic identity. Such externally oriented properties of ethnic groups demand our attention along with the cohesive forces. This distinction between internal cohesion and external boundaries can guide our inquiry into whether the concept of ethnic group applies to the Deaf-World. In the following two chapters, we examine the properties of ethnic groups and compare them to the properties of the ASL minority. We take up first the "internal" cultural properties and put off to Chapter 2 a discussion of "external properties"-ethnic boundaries and their maintenance.

Most of the families cited in this book have pedigrees at the following website: http://dvn.iq.harvard.edu/dvn/dv/DEA.* To see if a given individual appears in one or more of the pedigrees there, consult the Every Name Index in Appendix D at the back of this book. The pedigrees presented here in Figures 2 through 17 also appear at the website with much supplementary detail that could not be reproduced legibly in book format.

*[http. / /hdl.handle.net/1902.1 /12117]

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LANGUAGE

Language is a means of communication but it is also the purveyor of culture, including traditions, rituals, norms, values, and the language arts. Language, handed down across the generations, provides continuity with the past. It is a symbol of ethnicity and identity, and a force for social cohesion. There is no more authentic expression of an ethnic group than its language. To disparage that language disparages the people who speak it and praising their language praises them. When an ethnic group demands more equitable treatment for their language (for example, its use in the media and in schools), they are also seeking more equitable treatment for their group and their culture.' ASL signers hold very dear the communicative, cultural and emblematic functions of their language.

The language of the ethnic group also provides its name. An ethnic name is a label with which to refer to the group but it is much more than that. Group members feel it captures their very essence and evokes memories of their shared past. Thus it has resonance within the ethnic group and little or none outside. Some Native American tribes retained their tribal names until fully conquered by the Europeans, while others retain them to the present day. The group we have so far designated by its language, the ASL minority, does indeed have a name for their collective by which they refer to themselves in their manual-visual language. We will refer to this language minority by that name, adopting the English translation of their compound sign, DEAF-WORLD.2 Individual members of the group, when referring to themselves (not their collective), use the ASL sign DEAF.