Examining Deaf Students' Language Ideologies Through English-To-ASL
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Languages, Literacies, and Translations: Examining Deaf Students’ Language Ideologies through English-to-ASL Translations of Literature by Ruth Anna Spooner A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (English and Education) in the University of Michigan 2016 Doctoral Committee: Professor Anne Leslie Curzan, Chair Professor John Anthony Albertini, National Technical Institute for the Deaf Professor Anne Ruggles Gere Professor Elizabeth Birr Moje © Ruth Anna Spooner 2016 Acknowledgements First of all, I must thank my brilliant and wonderfully supportive committee— particularly Anne Curzan and Anne Ruggles Gere, who were also the co-chairs of my program—who invested hours upon hours teaching me, reading my work, asking questions, talking through ideas, offering feedback, and challenging me to grow as a teacher-scholar. I am especially indebted to Anne Curzan, who in her capacity as committee chair, patiently and intrepidly mucked through all of the drafts for each chapter of this dissertation (including the earliest, messiest ones), always making the time to offer thorough, thoughtful feedback. Your encouragement and guidance has helped to shape this project into what it has become; I could not have done it without you. Also, the ongoing conversations that I have had over the past five years with Anne Curzan and Anne Gere about my research work, about composition and literacy, about all things teaching, and about what it means to be a teacher and a scholar—I cannot describe how valuable your guidance and wisdom have been for me. Thank you. Elizabeth Moje, you were one of the first professors I worked with here at Michigan, and right from the start, you were exuberantly enthusiastic about my ideas and my work, and I am deeply grateful for your unfailing encouragement and your willingness to make space for me in your schedule even as you took on the time- consuming responsibilities of being an Assistant Dean (and later Dean) of the School of Education. John Albertini, you very courageously agreed to be an external member of this committee without having ever met me, and what is more, you took this project on even though you knew it would spill over into the first year of your retirement. The wealth of knowledge about research on deafness and literacy that you brought to this project have been indescribably helpful in enlightening, enriching, and honing the data analysis and early drafts of this dissertation. Many thanks, and I wish you a wonderfully fulfilling and adventure-filled retirement. ii I must also mention the community of my fellow students in the Joint Program in English and Education, whose constant friendship, generosity, and support have overwhelmed me time and time again from the very first day that I enrolled in the program. The writing groups, happy hour meetings, cohort get-togethers, and dinner gatherings were always filled with lively ideas and conversations not only about teaching and research but also about many other aspects of our lives. Any time I needed help— whether it was tracking down an article, sharing teaching resources, or requesting extra hands for moving apartments—all I had to do was say, “Um, could anyone…?” and practically before my request was even finished, I would be swarmed with responses and volunteers. JPEE students and alumni are the most generous of colleagues; I don’t know where I would be without them and their willingness to share their work, resources, and hard-learned wisdom. I am especially grateful to my cohort—Chris Parsons, Lizzie Hutton, and Chinyere Uzogara—who began this journey with me and with whom I have spent many hours talking through the ideas and arguments that went into our program examinations and, later, our dissertations. I could not have asked for a better cohort. Sarah Swofford also merits special mention, as she was one of the people in the program with some prior experience with ASL, and could therefore understand, appreciate, and interrogate my work in ways that other JPEE students could not. She has been a wonderful friend, mentor, and colleague. I am also grateful to the School for the Deaf administrators, teachers, and students, all of whom willingly jumped aboard with allowing me to use their school as a research site. They welcomed me to their campus with open arms and did whatever they could to ensure the data collection went smoothly. The Georgia School of the Deaf’s Accessibility Materials Project also deserves special thanks for allowing me to use their ASL translation of “The Tell-Tale Heart” in this study. It was way back in high school when the primordial seeds of my ideas about literary ASL translations began to germinate; for that, I have my deaf friends to thank. If iii I had not witnessed firsthand their experiences and struggles with reading—which stuck with me throughout college and eventually prompted me to enter graduate school—none of this would have taken place. I am deeply indebted to my deaf friends, past and present, and to the bold ASL translators and performers who went before me and whose work illuminated and shaped my own translations. I also thank the sagacious, quick-witted, and competitively humble professors of the Calvin College English Department under whom I studied as an undergraduate. Their unwavering dedication to quality teaching challenged me to not only become a better student but also a lifelong learner; it was their example that finally convinced me to pursue the profession of teaching. They were, in fact, the ones who first suggested I should consider a doctoral degree, an idea that I, in my junior year, immediately dismissed as ridiculous. Time, however, has proven them right. I remain forever indebted to them because I now realize that their inspiring and rigorous courses truly did prepare me for becoming a teacher and a scholar. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm and Heidi Estrem, both of Boise State University, were also instrumental in shaping me as a teacher of reading, writing, and literature; I am grateful to them. Finally, I would not be here without the support and dedication of my family— and especially my parents, whose work ethic, steadfast faith, and high expectations shaped me into the person who I am. When people ask me how I managed to overcome all of the obstacles that a profoundly deaf child faces in achieving print literacy fluency, I always point to my family. Unlike most hearing families with a deaf child, my parents and siblings all put great effort into learning how to sign at least moderately fluently right from the beginning, so I grew up being able to converse easily with everyone in my family. They all, each in their own way, taught me so much about the world around me; this language-rich environment was instrumental to my success with literacy. I also point to my mom in particular, who devoted countless hours to bettering her ASL skills, teaching me, and signing books out loud to me as a child. I cannot thank her enough for the time and sacrifice she put into making sure that I acquired language and literacy at the iv same pace as my hearing siblings did. I owe everything to her and to the rest of my family, who gave me the foundation to go forth into this world as a Deaf person and as a Deaf teacher-scholar. v Table of Contents Acknowledgements………………………………………………………..………………………………………..ii List of Tables…………………. ……………………….…………………..………………………………………....xi List of Figures ………………………………………………………………………………………………………..xii List of Appendices……………………………..………………………………………………………………….xiii Abstract………………………..………………………………………………………….………………………..….xiv CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION AND REVIEW OF LITERATURE .................................................1 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE DISSERTATION .........................................................................................................1 Research Questions..............................................................................................................................................4 A BRIEF REVIEW OF LITERATURE: TEACHING PRINT LITERACY TO THE DEAF............................................6 A Caveat: Dearth of Empirical Research ....................................................................................................7 Teaching Reading.................................................................................................................................................9 Teaching Writing............................................................................................................................................... 13 Closing Thoughts on Literacy Pedagogy for the Deaf ....................................................................... 15 A BRIEF REVIEW OF RELEVANT LITERATURE: LANGUAGE IDEOLOGIES AROUND DEAF EDUCATION... 16 A REVIEW OF RELEVANT LITERATURE: ENGLISH-TO-ASL TRANSLATIONS .............................................. 24 CONCLUSION............................................................................................................................................................ 26 ROADMAP FOR THE DISSERTATION .................................................................................................................... 27 CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORKS: LANGUAGE IDEOLOGIES, LITERACY, AND TRANSLATION...................................................................................................................................... 30 INTRODUCTION ......................................................................................................................................................