Deaf Literature Sampler: CODA-Deaf Parents-Hearing Children
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 family or hearing
childre and deaf parents 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=-
Autobiographies/Personal
Narratives/Biographies
Abrams, Charlotte. The
Silents. Washington, D.C.: Gallaudet UP. 4th floor and
ETRR, HQ759.912 .A27 1996.
Called the Silents by some, and the Shtimmers (its Yiddish equivalent) by others,
deaf Joe and Ruthie Herzberg were simply mother and father to Abrams and her
sister, Adelaide. In part, this is a straightforward story of growing up during
the Depression and WWII. It's also a nice, but unremarkable story of a child
discovering the difference between the image and the reality of her parents,
as when Abrams discovers that her quick-tempered father had been a hobo, a boxer
and a bootlegger. But much rarer and hence more affecting, are the scenes that
are unique to a hearing child of deaf parents. These give insights into a different
normalcy. Abrams describes how her parents tried to provide her and her sister
a "regular" childhood by having hearing friends and relatives come
to speak to them while they were young; and she recalls her mother's habit of
calling out, when the doorbell-activated light flashed, "Who is it?" even though she would never hear the answer. There was a crisis, when Abrams
was first given a radio and her father feared it as an activity that would divide
the household into hearing and not. At least until he discovered that the fights
were broadcast, and, surrounded by his deaf friends, he had the two girls sign
and act out the parts of the contenders. Strangely, what stand out most, are
the sounds: the knockings of a card player signaling a pass; the hmn, hmn that
is Abrams's father's laugh; her mother's crying as she grapples with the additional
hurdle of blindness; the whoops, groans and moans in a large, otherwise silent
party.
Blake, Michael F. A Thousand Faces: Lon Chaney's Unique Artistry in Motion Pictures. Lanham, MD: Vestal, 1995. PN2287.C48 B59 1995.
Follows the career of famous silent movie star.
Blake, Michael F. Lon Chaney: The Man Behind the Thousand Faces. Lanham, MD: Vestal, 1990. 3rd floor, PN2287.C48 B58 1993.
Follows the career of famous silent movie star.
Davis, Lennard J. My
Sense of Silence: Memoirs of a Childhood with Deafness. Urbana: University
of Illinois, 2000. 4th floor and ETRR HQ759.912.D38 2000.
His identity as a child of deaf adults led Davis (English, SUNY at Binghamton)
to edit and publish his parents' correspondence in Shall I Say a Kiss?: The
Courtship Letters of a Deaf Couple, 1936-38 (Gallaudet Univ., 1999). Davis's
new memoir focuses on how his parents' deafness affected him. He writes frankly
about the difficulties he encountered, such as his inability to call his parents
when he needed comfort during the night and his having to serve as their interpreter.
He also discusses his embarrassment at his Jewish immigrant parents' poor working-class
lifestyle during his childhood and adolescence in the Bronx. On the other hand,
the author also infuses his writing with humor and the sense of the love and
respect he developed for his parents and their accomplishments. In the epilog,
he even implies that his upbringing contributed to many of his own successes.
For instance, he mentions that his appreciation for language and strong communication
skills are related to his early experience with sign language. Indeed, Davis's
descriptions of the richness and complexity of sign language are the most fascinating
portions of the book.
Hale, Trudy W. The
Conflictual Experiences of Hearing African American Children of Deaf Parents.
Diss. Union Institute. 2001. Ann Arbor, MICH: UMI, 2001. ETRR HV2395 .H35 2001
Miller, R.H.. Deaf Hearing Boy: A Memoir. Washington, DC: Gallaudet UP, 2005. 4th floor and ETRR HQ759.912 .M55 2004
Mudgett-Decaro, Patricia. “On Being Both Hearing and Deaf: My Bicultural-Bilingual Experience.”
Cultural
and Language Diversity: The Deaf Experience. Ed. Ila Palasnis. New
York: Cambridge UP, 1996. Also available as an e book. Click on
title. 4th floor, Archives, and ETRR HV2545 .C85 1996.
Preston, Paul. Mother
Father Deaf: Living Between Sound and Silence. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
UP, 1994. 4th floor and ETRR HV2380.P73 1994.
Mother father deaf" is the phrase commonly used within the Deaf community
to refer to hearing children of deaf parents. These children grow up between
two cultures, the Hearing and the Deaf, forever balancing the worlds of sound
and silence, as a sense of self and family forms. Paul Preston is one of these
children, and in this book he takes us to the place where Deaf and Hearing cultures
meet, where families like his own embody the conflicts and resolutions of two
often opposing world views. Based on one hundred and fifty interviews with adult
hearing children of deaf parents throughout the United States, Mother Father
Deaf is rich in anecdote and analysis, remarkable for its insights into a family
life normally closed to outsiders. Unlike others who have studied this community,
focusing on pathology and family dysfunction, Preston lets a picture of hearing
life among deaf parents emerge from the personal stories of those who have lived
it. As they describe their family histories, their childhood memories, their
sense of themselves as adults, and their life choices, these men and women chart
the sometimes difficult middle ground between spoken and signed language, sameness
and otherness, the stigmatizing and the stigmatized. Their stories challenge
many of mainstream society's common myths and beliefs about hearing and deafness
and illustrate the drama of belonging and being different as it unfolds within
the self. In light of these personal narratives. Preston examines the process
of assimilation and cultural affiliation among a population whose lives incorporate
the paradox of being culturally "Deaf" yet functionally hearing. His
book explores the culturally relative nature of families and the assumptions
and expectations that all of us hold to be not only important but vital to our
well-being as individuals and as a society.
Sidransky, Ruth. In
Silence: Growing Up Hearing in a Deaf World. New York : St. Martin's, 1990. 4th floor (3 copies) and ETRR HQ759.912 .S53 1990.
This autobiographical tour of the world of the deaf is conducted by the hearing
offspring of a deaf couple. At the center of Sidransky's chronicle are Benny
and Mary, the parents whose busy hands speak the rich language of Sign. Although
their deafness caused Sidransky discomfort as a schoolgirl in Brooklyn and the
Bronx, family life was filled with caring and laughter. Mary and Benny reveled
in their daughter's ease in the hearing society, she drew from them and here
pays homage to their spirit and to the signing that allowed them all such astonishingly
rich and powerful communication. Sidransky, an advocate of signing who lectures
about the deaf, cites the 'great mystery that resides within the crucible of
hands.' For the hearing, the book helps demystify the world of the deaf.
Walker, Lou Ann. A
Loss for Words: The Story of Deafness in a Family. New York: Harper & Row, 1986. 4th floor (2 copies) and ETRR HV2395.W34 1986.
This is much more of a story than the subtitle suggests, beautifully written
and deeply affecting. Born in the Midwest in 1952, Walker is one of three hearing
daughters of Gale and Doris Jean Walker, both deafened as babies by illnesses.
As the oldest child, the author served as her parents' ``interpreter,'' dealing
with outsiders. There is humor in her recollections but nothing lighthearted
in accounts of crude or condescending reactions to her father and mother from
indifferent people. Walker is candid in detailing her own frustrations and the
burdens of life with the deaf. Having graduated from Harvard, she eagerly went
her own way, establishing a writing career in New York, but she reunites frequently
with the family in a home warm with love and shared memories. The reader says
a fervent amen when the author declares, ``I'd seen plenty of families where
there was more communication and less love.''
Bibliography
Bull, Thomas.
On the Edge of Deaf Culture: Hearing Children/Deaf Parents. Alexandria,
VA: Deaf Family Research, 1998. REF, 4th floor and ETRR HV2380.B75 1998.
An amazing resource for those interested in hearing children of deaf parents,
Bull's book is truly comprehensive in scope, covering the spectrum of information
sources--refereed academic journal articles, unpublished theses and dissertations,
electronic resources, works from the popular press, made-for-TV movies. It provides
a map for a territory not only uncharted but until recently largely unrecognized
as a legitimate field of study. Essential for any program or person dealing
with family issues concerning deafness: undergraduate and graduate programs,
researchers, service providers, mental health practitioners, children of deaf
adults (codas), and other family members.
Biography
Barash, Harvey L. Our Father Abe: The Story of a Deaf Shoe Repairman.
Madison, Wis.: ABAR, 1991. 4th floor HV2534.B3B3 1991.
Strenkowski, Peg. Silent
Journey: Life Within a Deaf Family. Chapel Hill, NC: Professional.
3rd floor and ETRR RF290 .S87 1999.
A poignant true life story which begins in the early 1900s when, infant Maggie,
rendered deaf from spinal meningitis, struggles to survive during a time when
the handicapped were derided and formal education for the deaf was controversial.
Her family raised her on instinct alone. Maggie did not go to school until she
was 9 years old. She developed a strong will to learn, a sence of competitiveness
and a dedicated spirit. The story watches her grow through adolescence, become
a loving wife, devoted mother and exceptional grandmother. She touched may lives
and became a true inspiration in a world still tinged with bigotry.
Drama
*Verhoosky, Michele Maureen. The Middle of Nowhere. Old Saybrook,
CT: Maureen Verhoosky, 1996. RES PS3572.E756M544 1996. E-reserve.
Fiction
Ferris, Jean. Of Sound Mind. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 2001.
3rd floor, PZ7.F4174 0f 2001.
Tired of interpreting for his deaf family and resentful of their reliance on
him, high school senior Theo finds support and understanding from Ivy, a new
student who also has a deaf parent.
Glickfield, Carole L. Useful
Gifts: Stories. Athens: University of Georgia, 1989. 3rd floor,
PS3557.L514 U84 1989.
This is narrated by a CODA, Ruthie, and several of her friends growing up with
deaf parents in Brooklyn during the 1940's. Ruthie's parents were uneducated
immigrants from Europe who make adjustments to a variety of cultures. The first
half of the novel focuses on her childhood; the second half occurs during the
1970's when Ruthie returns to her home from California to visit her elderly
father who lives in a deaf senior citizens retirement home. By the end of the
novel, she comes to terms with her own identity as separate from her parents
who had depended on her while she was growing up. (Rosen, 1993).
Greenberg, Joanne. In
This Sign. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1984. 3rd floor (2
copies) and ETRR. PS3557.R378I5 1984. See video “Love is Never Silent”.
A story about a hearing daughter for deaf parents growing up during the Depression
years.
Whitney, Phyllis A. Feather
on the Moon. New York: Doubleday. 1988.
Jenny Blake is hearing and lives with her deaf parents. Not only has she grown
up bilingual in ASL and English, she has also taught her hearing daughter to
be bilingual. At age three. Jenny's daughter is abducted. Seven years after
the abduction. Jenny receives a strange letter concerning the mysterious appearance
of a little girl who seems to fit the description of Jenny's daughter. Jenny
travels across the U. S. to meet this little girl and determine her identity.
Jenny discovers, through the use of ASL, that the girl is indeed her own lost
daughter.
Videos
Autobiography/Personal Narratives
Man of a Thousand Faces. Universal City, CA: MCA Home Video, 1998. B&W, Voiced, Captioned.1st floor, 5 Day Collection.
Follows the career of famous silent movie star, Lon Chaney.
Tomorrow Dad
Will Be Deaf: And Other Stories. Dir. Yoon Lee. Prod. Joe Dannis. Perf.
Bonnie Kraft. Interviewer, Ben Bahan. Dawn Pictures, 1997. 90 mins.Color/Signed/Voiced/Captioned.
4th floor, HV 2392.2T66 1997 and ETRR VIDEO 6559.
Bonnie Kraft tells stories from her perspective as a hearing child of deaf adults
(CODA), and Ben Bahan interviews her.
Documentary
Passport Without a Country. Dir. Cameron Davie. Films for the
Humanities, 1992. 47 mins. Captioned/Voiced/Color. 4th floor,
HV2395 .P37 1995.
Explores the life of hearing children of deaf parents. Provides a look at a
unique culture: men and women who do not quite belong to either of the worlds
between which they are the only bridge
Video: Entertainment
Beyond Silence. Dir. Sylvie Testud. Perf. Emmanuelle Laborit.
Miramax, 1997.Color/Voiced/Subtitled/Signed. 1st floor, 5 Day Collection. German
Sign Language.
Engrossing, sentimental drama about a hearing child who must balance her dreams
against her deaf parents' needs. Ninety percent of deaf parents have children
who can hear, and Beyond Silence, which was nominated for an Academy Award for
Best Foreign Film, is story of the conflict between isolation and belonging
that occurs so often in such families. Based on Ruth Sidranky's novel, In Silence,
the film is spoken in German and German sign language and captioned in English.
I Love You. DVD. Universe Laser & Video, 2001. 112 mins. Color/Voiced/Signed/Captioned. 3rd floor, PN1995.9.D35 I33 2001. In Japanese and Japanese sign language. Close captioned (letter box) in Chinese (traditional), Chinese (simplified) and English.
Ai is embarrassed and bullied at school because her mother, Asako, is Deaf. In order to encourage a more positive attitude towards the Deaf, Asako enrolls her daughter and herself in a theatrical troupe together. Problems occur between the Deaf and hearing actors during rehearsals, but they learn to work together. Ai also learns that her mother had lost her hearing while giving birth to Ai. Mother and daughter reconcile, and Ai has a greater understanding and respect for her mother and for the Deaf.
Khamoshi: The Musical. Iselin, NJ: Video Sound, 2002. Color/Voiced/Signed/Captioned. 3rd floor, PN1995.9.D35 K53 2002 .
This is the story of Annie, whose parents are deaf. As a child Annie learns music from her grandmother, who teaches her piano and singing. After a tragedy in her family, Annie's father sells the piano and her life is filled with silence. She later meets a singer, Raj, who brings music back into her life. Annie is torn between loyalty to her family and her own desires
Koshish. Sacramento, CA : Bollywood Entertainment, 200? Color/Voiced/Signed/Captioned. 3rd floor PN1995.9.D35 K675 2000z.
In India, a deaf couple fall in love and marry. Their first child dies in an accident, andd they feel that they could have prevented his death if they could have heard him. A blind man helps them raise their second boy. When the boy grows up, his father arranges his marriage with a deaf girl. The son learns a lesson from his parents' lives and experiences
Love is Never Silent.
Marian Rees Associates, 1985. 120 mins. Color/Captioned/Voiced. ETRR VIDEO
5863
An adaptation of In This Sign book, focuses on a CODA growing up experiences
with deaf parents.
Websites:
Children of Deaf Adults (CODA): http://www.coda-international.org/
Deaf/Hearing Relationships
and Friendships
Fiction-Short Stories
Greenberg, Joanne. "And Sarah Laughed". Rites of Passage.
New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1972. 119-132.
This American Depression Years story includes the two main characters from In
This Sign (Janice and Abel). Abel brings his deaf bride home to meet his parents.
Abel's father is deaf, but his mother is hearing and has never accepted her
son's nor her husband's deafness. She secretly had hoped that sending Abel to
the deaf school would make him "normal". She learns what it feels
like to be left out when her husband, son and daughter in law can communicate
in ASL but she cannot.
Hofsteater, H.T. "Dummy". The Silent Muse. Ed. Robert Panara. Toronto, Canada: Gallaudet
College Alumni Assn., 1960. Archives, 3rd floor and ETRR (2 copies) PS508.DS54
1960.
Short story of a deaf character whose relationship with a hearing woman comes
to a jarring close on her wedding day.
Fiction
Kennedy, Margaret. Not in the Calendar. New York: Macmillan, 1964.
Simple story about a deaf girl who rises to success as an artist, and her hearing
friend who becames an educator to the deaf.
Riddell, F. Silent
World. London: Geoffrey Bles, 1934.
Romantic novel in which a man, deaf from shock since age one, regains his hearing
following a car accident at the age of 28. He reenters the hearing world, rejects
his deaf wife, and falls in love with a hearing woman. The deaf wife is left
to care for the deaf child of their broken marriage.
Personal Narrative
Finton, Lynn. “Living in a Bilingual-Bicultural Family”. Cultural
and Language Diversity: The Deaf Experience.
Ed. Ila Parasnis. New York: Cambridge UP, 1996. Also available
as an e book. Click on title. 4th floor, Archives, and ETRR HV2545 .C85 1996.
Drama
*Baldwin, Stephen. Sign and Sound A’Loving: The Dinner Encounter.
RES, Archives, 3rd floor PS3552.A549 A19 1978b. E-Reserve.
*Holcomb, Thomas K. Side
by Side. 1994. RES PS3558.O536 S54 1994. E-Reserve.
Medoff, Mark. Children
of a Lesser God. Amber Lane Press, 1982. RES PS3563.E27 C47 1982. See
video.
Video
Children of a Lesser
God. Perf. William Hurt and Marlee Matlin. Paramount Pictures, 1986.
Color/Captioned/Voiced/Some Signs. 1st floor, 5 day collection and ETC VH1829.
See play.
The winner of a Tony Award, this movie tells the story of a deaf woman who refuses
to succumb to hearing society's image of what a deaf person should be.
Guide created by
Joan Naturale 31 March 2004.
Email: JXNWML@rit.edu
Links checked 17 August 2004.
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