A Deaf Adult Speaks Out

by Leo Jacobs

Leo Jacobs has written a unique and personal account of what it is like to be deaf in a hearing world. He speaks out on such issues as mainstreaming and its effect on deaf children and the Deaf community, total communication versus oralism, employment opportunities for deaf adults, and public policy toward deaf people.

This new edition includes an update of services by and for deaf people, and an expanded chapter on legislation and social issues that have had an impact on the Deaf community in the last ten years.

Genres: Nonfiction, History

169 pages, Paperback

First published October 25, 1974

Reviews

[Jason Pettus · Rating 4 out of 5]

As friends already know, due to my ever-declining hearing, here at the age of 50 I've decided to learn American Sign Language (ASL) for the first time; and one of the things I'm doing parallel to that is taking a deep dive into the Deaf community with a capital "D," in that the entire reason I'm learning ASL is so I can start becoming more social again, without the barrier of ambient noise at bars and coffeehouses that has been profoundly shrinking my social life in the last decade.

The subject deserves a closer look before I get into the specifics of this particular book, because the Deaf community is an unexpected and sometimes tricky thing for hearing people to navigate, and a key to understanding that is to examine why that is in the first place. As I've been rapidly learning this year, people without the ability to hear have been treated shockingly terribly for a whole lot longer than you would expect; for example, the first time someone even attempted to argue that ASL is a legitimate language wasn't until 1965 (when William Stokoe wrote the first-ever ASL dictionary), and the Supreme Court didn't agree with this argument until all the way in 1989, the main impetus behind the Americans With Disabilities Act just one year later (and itself largely the result of the student protests at Washington DC's Gallaudet University one year previous, considered by the Deaf community as its watershed "Stonewall" moment).

This means, for example, that as recently as the George Bush presidency, the police were under no obligation whatsoever to provide a sign language interpreter to a deaf person they've arrested, or for the courts to provide an interpreter at their trial, and schools largely did not recognize ASL as an acceptable option for foreign language requirements; and this is to say nothing of the fact that from literally the 1920s to 1970s, the official position of the government and educational system was that ASL was silly nonsense that would just lead to more problems with deaf people fitting into "real" society, and that they should instead be forced to learn how to speak without ever hearing the sounds of voices, and to read lips despite decades of studies proving that lip-reading simply doesn't work (no matter what fanciful depictions of it you've seen from Hollywood). Which, for another example, led to new mothers being taught to not communicate with their babies at all, until they were old enough to be able to be taught to futilely and unsuccessfully follow what was being said by watching hearing people's lips move.

It's a grand tragedy that those of us in the the 21st century largely don't realize ever happened; and what it's led to is deaf people basically forming their own ethnic group that they call "Deaf" with a capital D, a fiercely proud and instantly confrontational community that feels the need to defend itself against any slight no matter how minor, precisely because they've been treated so criminally poorly for so long. The main tenet of the Deaf community is that the act of not hearing is not a disability but rather a feature, the same way for example you wouldn't call someone from France disabled just because they can't speak English; and that this feature leads to closer and more intimate friendships, a bigger curiosity about the world, a more attuned sense of one's surroundings, a larger sense of tolerance and empathy, purer political beliefs, and all kinds of other benefits that the "hearies" of the world are simply missing out on. This is why, for example, most Deaf people claim that they wouldn't choose to become hearing even if given the option, and why so many of them are so passionately against their children receiving cochlear implants, attitudes that most hearing people find challenging to say the least.

And that finally leads us to A Deaf Adult Speaks Out by Leo M. Jacobs, the first-ever Chair of Deaf Studies at Gallaudet, itself the first-ever (and still only) fully accredited American four-year university exclusively for the Deaf. Before anything else, be aware that despite the contemporary cover that's been slapped on the front, the contents are badly dated -- the first edition was published in 1974, and even the "revised" one only dates to 1994, while Jacobs himself would be well over 110 years old now if he was still alive. But that's kind of the whole point of even reading it, in that this is arguably the first book in human history to rationally and convincingly lay out the arguments that now make up the basic fundamentals by which the Deaf community now defines itself. Among its "radical" arguments that are now considered mainstream...

--ASL should be acknowledged as the standard language of the Deaf community, capable of communicating linguistically sophisticated intellectual concepts at the same speed as a spoken conversation;

--Mothers should begin signing with their babies as soon as possible, so that their spongy, curious infant brains don't atrophy at such a crucial development stage (which by the 2010s has led to the uber-trendy YouTube subject of "baby sign");

--Deaf people should be legally recognized as being able to do anything a hearing person can do, including drive, attend college, practice law, and have the final say regarding all their medical decisions;

--Deaf people should be considered bilingual, with ASL their primary language and English only their second;

--So-called "oralism" has been conclusively proven to be a failure, and it's time to stop forcing those without hearing to attempt it;

--Formally teaching so-called "Total Communication" (now known as "Pidgin Sign Language," the act of combining ASL with such hearing activities as mouthing words or the "ok" sign) does more harm than good, an acceptable street substitute in the same way "Spanglish" is, but not something to take the place of ASL within classrooms;

--Laws should exist that guarantee all these rights, as well as requiring closed-captioning for all television programs and sign-language interpreters for all taxpayer funded organizations;

--And the hard of hearing should legally be considered Deaf themselves, and afforded all these same rights.

So, make no mistake, the book itself is dryly stuffy, its prose exactly as purplish as you would expect from someone who was born in 1910; but it's a key foundational text for understanding the Deaf community, particularly illuminating for being written when these kinds of demands were fanciful science-fiction dreams, with many of them now being the standard reality of the last 30 years. There's still a long way to go (not least of which is that I have to do this long a write-up to explain it all in the first place); but there's been a profound amount of progress for the Deaf community in the last generation, with people like Jacobs largely to thank for it. That makes A Deaf Person Speaks Out still well worth your time, even if it is a slog to actually get through.

[Charlie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I haven't had as many interactions with the deaf community as I would like, but I've always been interested in learning more. The deaf people I've met have tended to be more sympathetic to the needs of other marginalised groups of people, since they have a deeper understanding of what it's like to be marginalised. This book was a good introduction, even though I wonder how Mr Jacobs's experience would be different if he were not a white man. As a person with above-average hearing, I obviously have a very different way of seeing the world than those within the deaf community, but I will be taking ASL at school next quarter in hopes of increasing my ability to communicate, and I am very excited.

[Amber · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was required reading for a deaf culture class in college, I believe. I didn't get around to reading it until last week (whoa!). It's a quick read and also written by a deaf adult from a deaf family. He's brilliant in how he lays out the facts of the deaf society's journey in the United States. He addresses different types of deafness, contrasting family relationships with hearing families and deaf families in relation to a deaf child, societies' stereotypes and appreciation of the deaf, various ideologies of education for the deaf, and laws that affect the deaf as a whole. One downside is that it's outdated because it was updated (1989) before the Video Relay Service was invented and used by so many deaf. Also, texting and email has exploded since it was last updated. However, his point that obtaining employment so often will be dependent on one's ability to communicate verbally over the phone is still a reality. He does take a fair look at the limitations that a deaf person's upbringing will cause upon them, but offers solutions in how to correct limitations by offering a full education (with Total Communication) and complete acceptance of who they are by their parents and family!

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was given the third edition as a gift. It came out in 1989, so a lot has changed in the deaf community (video calling, internet, texting, cochlear implants, the ADA). Some of the book rang very true. Some of it was not useful to me, such as the list and descriptions of deaf organizations. Some of it was meant to be informational, some persuasive (in favor of ASL, deaf schools, etc) but I wasn’t sure exactly who it was meant to persuade. Maybe education students considering which method to use as teachers of the deaf. I would recommend this to someone who wants to read a description of the state of the deaf world in the 1970s and 80s.

[Zoe Croman · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book had good information and a point it wanted to communicate, but had a habit of using a ten dollar word where a one dollar would do and saying in ten words, often repeated, what a few would state more elegantly.