Deaf Literature Sampler: Abuse, Substance Abuse
Asterik * indicates a D/deaf
author. All book reviews are either from Amazon, the Einstein Catalog, publishing
catalogs, bibliographies in the back of anthologies, Janet Rosen, a librarian
from Washington, DC, and articles by Robert Panara. Efforts have been made to
include as many genres as possible—nonfiction (autobiographies, personal
narratives, biographies, essays, interviews and articles), drama, fiction (novels,
historical fiction) poetry (ASL and English) and ASL Literature. All formats
are covered, including videos.
For more books on this topic,
check the Einstein Catalog and search by keywords deaf and abuse http://albert.rit.edu/.
For more articles on this topic, check out the Gallaudet Index to Deaf Periodicals
which includes citations to Deaf Life and other popular deaf publications http://liblists.wrlc.org/gadpi/home.htm. Another database you might want to try is the NTID Deaf Index. Go to the Deaf Studies databases and explore. http://wally.rit.edu/electronic/topic/deafstudies.html
If a book is not housed at Wallace Library or ETRR , try Connect NY http://www.connectny.info/screens/opacmenu.html
to see if area college libraries have it. If not, send your request via
Interlibrary Loan http://wally.rit.edu/myaccount/ill.html.
Your book usually arrives within a few days.
Also, The Tactile Mind is a literary print publication for the signing
community. http://www.thetactilemind.com/.
We have this publication on the CMS and in bound periodical format (back
issues). 2nd floor PER PS508.D43T335. Another journal you might find useful is Sign Language Studies available
online via the Einstein Catalog in the Project Muse database. http://albert.rit.edu/search/tsign+language+studies/tsign+language+studies/1,2,9,B/frameset&FF=tsign+language+studies&7,,8/indexsort=-
Abuse --- Autobiographies/Personal
Narratives
*Bertling, Tom. A
Child Sacrificed to the Deaf Culture. Wilsonville, OR: Kodiak Media
Group, 1994. 4th floor (3 copies) and ETRR (2 copies) HV2534.B47.A3 1994.
Bertling shares his subjective and unpopular views on deaf culture, deaf education,
and deaf children. He attended a residential school and has deaf family members.
*Bertling, Tom. No Dignity for Joshua : More Vital Insight into Deaf Children,
Deaf Education, and Deaf Culture. Wilsonville, OR: Kodiak Media Group,
1997. 4th floor (2 copies) and ETRR (2 copies) HV2545.B395 1997.
Bertling surveys and offers subjective opinions on such controversial issues
as cochlear implants, sexual abuse at residential deaf schools, militancy within
the deaf community and deaf community leadership. Contributes to the on-going
dialogue and debate of issues key to deaf community interests and to the education
and assimilation of deaf children.
*Bolander, Anne M. as told
to Adair N. Renning. I Was #87: One Woman’s Story of Misdiagnosis,
Institutionalization, and Abuse. Washington, DC: Gallaudet UP, 2000. 4th floor and ETRR HV2534.B63 A3 2000.
In relating the story of how she was misdiagnosed as retarded rather than deaf
and mistreated at home and at an institution, a longtime employee of General
Motors writes: "I sincerely hope that this book will help other children
with as-yet undiagnosed hearing problems be spared the horrors I experienced."
The co-author has written about her autistic child.
*Buck, Dennis S. Deaf
Peddler: Confessions of an Inside Man. Washington, DC: Gallaudet UP, 2000. 4th floor and ETRR HF5459.U6 B83 2000. See 25 Cents script.
Buck stopped his 11-year stint of selling the Hi I'm Deaf cards in airports
and train stations when the National Association of the Deaf convinced him that
the practice reinforced the stereotype of deaf people as pitiful disabled wretches.
Here he traces the history of deaf peddling, explains its daily organization
and its benefits and drawbacks, and discusses the continuing exploitation of
undereducated deaf people by oppressive overseers. Of course he includes many
personal anecdotes, such as organizing his rounds using a spreadsheet program
and sneaking in open hotel rooms to take showers. The personal memoir is without
scholarly paraphernalia.
*Pitts-Ripperton, Margaret
A. The Silent Cry: Lost Among the Hearing. Kiwe,
2002. 4th floor, HV2534.P567 P5673 2003
Autobiographical account of a person who survived years of abuse and survived
on the street.
Abuse-Biographies
Bakke, David and Mary Chapin Carpenter. God Knows His Name: The True Story
of John Doe No. 24. Carbondale: Southern Illinoise UP, 2000. 4th floor HV2534.D63B35 2000.
Though labeled "feeble-minded" by bureaucrats and lacking an established
identity, African-American deaf and mute John Doe Boyd led a remarkable though
sad life in the Illinois mental health care system. Through personal interviews
and research, journalist Bakke (coauthor, The Last of the Market Hunters, Illinois
Univ., 1996) recounts his subject's life, from being picked up as a teenager
by police in Jacksonville, IL, in 1945 to his last years as a blind man who
was able to communicate and form strong relationships. More than one person's
story, the narrative highlights the postwar history of mental health care in
Illinois, from the harrowing days of institutional life in the 1950s to the
more humane era of deinstitutionalization, community-based treatment, and psychopharmacology.
Given the neglect, overcrowding, and violent conditions that John experienced
as a young adult, his accomplishments will inspire any reader.
*Paris, Damara. “Michael’s
Freedom”. Deaf Esprit. Ed. Damara Paris and Mark Drolsbaugh.
Salem, OR: AGO Gifts and Publications, 1999. 128-130. 3rd floor and ETRR PS508.D43
D4 1999.
About a deaf boy in India who ended up with no education, in prison and was
later tended to by Mother Teresa. He was sent to an orphanage and later adopted
by an American couple.
”Prisoners of Fear,
Victims of Hope: The Ordeal of Los Muditos.” Deaf Life 10:8
(Feb. 1998): 10-26. 2nd floor, Bound Periodicals HV2350.D45
About Mexican immigrants forced to sell trinkets and ABC cards and held in slavery
in NYC.
Rubin, Paul. “Reckless
Abandonment.” Deaf Life 7:12 (June 1995): 10-24. 2nd floor,
Bound Periodicals HV2350.D45
About a female who experienced abuse, rape, and neglect before being helped.
Swofford, Stan. “Trapped
in an Insane World.” Deaf Life 6:2 (Aug. 1993): 19-27. 2nd
floor, Bound Periodicals HV2350.D45
About Junius Wilson, an African-American deaf man confined to institutions most
of his life because of misdiagnosis.
Abuse-Drama
Harris, Elmer. Johnny Belinda: A Play in Three Acts. New York:
Dramatist Play Service, 1940. RES PS3515.A744I55.
Drama about a young deaf woman set in Prince Edward Island, off Nova Scotia,
Canada. She is harshly treated by her father, the community, and especially
a roughneck who rapes her. A doctor form Montreal, however, befreiends her and
teaches her to communicate in sign language. The plot ends melodramatically
in a murder trial, but the play stresses the importance of sign language and
the deaf heroine’s capacity to learn and live a normal life. (Video version
available in video stores).
*Kelstone, Aaron Weir. 25 Cents: A Play. Minneapolis, MN: Tactile
Mind, 2003. RES PS3561.E395T83 2003. See book Deaf Peddler.
Even though the old Deaf peddler warns his friend Brian otherwise, Brian stays
around for his stories. Harry sees Brian with the peddler, whom he doesn't accept
as a Deaf person. Their confrontation reveals different points of view on the
peculiar institution of Deaf peddling. Age-old questions of pride and shame
arise as they try to untangle themselves from cultural labels.
Abuse-Fiction
Arnold, Madelyn. Bird-Eyes. Seal,1988. 3rd floor, PS3551.R535
B56 1988
In a fictitious mental hospital in a mid-western town in 1965, Anna, a middle-aged
deaf ASL-user who cannot lipread or speak is receiving treatment for depression
following the death of her husband. She is befriended by the heroine of the
story, a 16-year old runaway girl with normal hearing, who was hospitalized
for being "incorrigible.' The teenager learns to communicate with Anna
in ASL (which they were both often punished for using), and the teenager is
given courage and strength (through her friendship with Anna) in overcoming
her repressive hospital environment. (Rosen, 1993).
Faulkner, William. "Hand
Upon the Waters". Knight's Gambit. New York: Random House,
1966. 3rd floor, PS3511.A86K5 1966.
Short story in which a deaf orphan avenges the death of his mentally retarded
guardian by killing his guardian's murderer.
Flanigan, Sara. Alice.
New York: St. Martin's, 1988.
Alice is a non-signing uneducated deaf teen growing up during the 1940's. She
has spent most of her 16 years locked up in a shed because her stepfather doesn't
want her around. She is rescued by two neighborhood children who successfully
communicate with her using gestures and home signs. They also teach her independence.
Maraini, Dacia. The
Silent Dutchess. New York: Feminist, 2000. 3rd floor, PQ 4873.A69 l8613 2000.
The heroine of this novel, Marianna, is a duchess in early 18th-century Sicily.
She is deaf and dumb, but she wasn't born that way. As she turns 40, she realizes
that she has been married (since she was 13) to the uncle who raped her when
she was five years old. This traumatic revelation triggers her physical disabilities,
compelling her to seek refuge in books and letters. Marianna decides to travel
after her husband dies and even turns down an attractive marriage proposal in
order to be independent for the first time in her life. Maraini's (e.g., Voices,
Serpent's Tail, 1997) writing is elegant, and her graphic descriptions of the
luxurious life of the aristocracy in sharp contrast to the squalor of the majority
living in poverty are quite realistic. The Silent Duchess was made into a movie
in 1996.
Yankowitz. Susan. Silent
Witness. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 1976. 3rd floor, PS3575.A54S5
Anna, deaf since birth, and receiving no formal education, does not know ASL
and has no usable speech, but has taught herself to lipread and act in ways
she understands to be appropriate in society by imitating others' behavior.
Now, as a young woman in a mid-Western city in the 1970's, she is on her own,
without her family to support her. She easily finds work as a prostitute, and
witnesses the murder of one of her lovers. Because she cannot communicate to
the police what really happened, she is condemned to a life-sentence in prison,
where she can retreat to a safe world of her own. (Rosen, 1993).
Abuse---Video Dramatizations
Anywhere, to Anyone.
By Cathy Schechter. Dir. Boo Inks. Orchard Communications, 2000. 17 mins. Color/Signed.
1st floor, 5 day collection HV6626.7.A59 2000.
Dramatizations of abuse of deaf women. Cuts across all class and education levels.
*Me Too!
By Patti Durr. Dir. Aaron Weir Kelstone. Prod. Stacey Bick.Perf. Patrick Graybill,
Clarice Bondoc, Roxann Richards, Aaron Weir Kelstone, Khara Austie, Troy Chapman,
Sharon Stachle, Richard Jones, Jeremy Quiroga, Erin Finion, Patti Durr, Vicki
Nordquist, Beth Metlay, Deirdre Schlehofer, and Jennifer Blatto-ValleeRochester,
NY: NTID/RIT, 2003. 78 mins. Color/Signed/Voiced/Captioned. 1st floor 5 day
collection RC560.S44 M4 2003 and ETRR VIDEO 6660.
Monologues show a wide range of sexual abuse and relationships in violent situations--from
victims, children of abuse, abusers, to survivors
The gift (topic: sexual abuse) -- Soap (topic: incest) -- Mail time (topic:
battered wife syndrome) -- To Mrs. JKW (topic: domestic violence, DV) -- Pop
(topic: molestation) -- Leave your mark (topic: sexual assault) -- Confession
(topic: sex addiction) -- It's nothin' (topic: sexual harassment) -- Head me
(topic: date rape) -- Monkey in the middle (topic: CODA of DV) -- Matchbox (topic:
DCODA of DV) -- You are never alone (topic: stalking)
Abuse-Websites
Advocacy Services for Abused
Deaf Women.
http://www.asadv.org
If you want to explore more
websites, go to: http://wally.rit.edu/internet/subject/deafness.html#men
Substance Abuse--Autobiographies
*Lala, Frank James John.
“From an Abyss of Addiction, A Deaf Adult Child Survives”. Deaf
Esprit. Ed. Damara Good Paris and Mark Drolsbaugh. Salem, OR: AGO Gifts
and Publications, 1999. 3rd floor and ETRR PS508.D43 D4 1999.
*Miller, Betty. Deaf
and Sober: Journeys Through Recovery. Silver Spring, MD: NAD,
1998. 4th floor and ETRR HV4999.D43M55 1998.
Narratives
*Lala, Frank James John.
Counseling the Deaf Substance Abuser. Chicago: Adams, 1998.
4th floor HV4999.D43L35 1998.
Video Narratives
Mental Health Video
Series: I Can. By Nancy Moser and Michael Strong. Sign Enhancers, 1991-1993.
60 mins. Color/Signed/Voiced/Captioned. 4th floor, HV4999.D43M45
1991.
Stories of deaf and hard of hearing people in recovery.
ASL Translation of
AA's Twelve steps and Twelve Traditions. Perf. Patrick Graybill, Dorothy
Wilkins and Richard Smith. Rochester Institute of Technology, NTID, 2003. 30
mins. Color/Signed. 4th floor, HV5278 .A7 2003.
Presents a translation of the Twelve steps and Twelve traditions of Alcoholics
Anonymous into sign language.
Web Sites
SAISD – Substance Abuse
Intervention Services for the Deaf
http://www.rit.edu/~257www/
If you want to explore more
websites, go to: http://wally.rit.edu/internet/subject/deafness.html#men
Guide created by Joan Naturale 31
March 2004.
Email: JXNWML@rit.edu
Links checked 17 August 2004.
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