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MOVING BEYOND WORDS IN SCOTLAND’S CORP-ORAL TRADITIONS BRITISH SIGN LANGUAGE STORYTELLING MEETS THE ‘DEAF PUBLIC VOICE’ ELLA LEITH MA (Hons) Scottish Ethnology MSc (Res.) Scottish Studies Department of Celtic and Scottish Studies This thesis is submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Science, GRADUATE SCHOOL of LITERATURES, LANGUAGES, and CULTURES Abstract Scotland’s oral traditions have received scholarly attention since the 18th Century; however, collection and analysis has exclusively focused on those passed on ‘by word of mouth,’ and the traditional arts of Scotland’s deaf communities have been overlooked. This thesis begins to address this oversight by examining storytelling practices passed on ‘by sign of hand’ in British Sign Language (BSL). Neither fully acculturated to majority society nor ‘foreigners in their own country’ (Murray 2008:102), signing-deaf people have distinct ways of ‘doing’ culture which involve negotiating a bilingual-bicultural continuum between the hearing and deaf worlds. The historical exclusion of signing-deaf culture from conceptualisations of Scotland’s cultural heritage is increasingly being challenged, both overtly and tacitly, through an emergent ‘deaf public voice’ (Bechter 2008:72); in light of this, I consider three case-studies in which BSL storytelling practices have been placed in the public domain. Drawing on fieldwork, interviews and the in-depth analysis of BSL performance- texts, I examine the ways in which signing-deaf biculturality is expressed and performed, and consider the artistry involved in storytelling in a visual-spatial-kinetic language. In so doing, a working methodology is proposed for presenting signed material to non-signers, laying the groundwork for further collection and analysis. Applying Bauman and Murray’s concept of ‘Deaf Gain’ (2009), I argue that the study of this new corpus of oral material has a radical contribution to make to the field of ethnology and folklore, not least in highlighting phonocentric assumptions embedded in the study of oral traditions. I emphasise the extent to which the transmission of culture is predicated on particular ‘techniques of the body’ (Mauss 1973), and argue that, in drawing on different modality-specific affordances, both spoken and signed storytelling should be understood as part of the totality of Scotland’s ‘corp-oral’ traditions through which culture is transmitted ‘by performance of body.’ 1 Declaration This is to certify that the work contained within has been composed by me and is entirely my own work. No part of this thesis has been submitted for any other degree or professional qualification. Ella Leith Date: 26th February 2016 2 For Dad Despite everything Because of everything 3 Acknowledgements There are so many people deserving of gratitude in helping me get to through this. Firstly, enormous thanks are due to my wonderful supervisors, Professor Gary West and Dr Will Lamb, who went far beyond the call of duty. It has been a privilege to enthuse with you and learn from you. I am also indebted to my excellent examiners, Professor Michael Wilson and Dr Neill Martin, whose enthusiasm for this work was beyond gratifying. This thesis would not have been possible without the generous funding of the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland – thank you for giving me this opportunity. Particular gratitude is owed to the people who so generously let me interview them, work with them and make use of their art: Andy Carmichael, Bob Duncan, Lilian Lawson, Mark MacQueen, Frankie McLean, Bryan Marshall, Jemina Napier, Tessa Padden and Gary Quinn. Your generosity is deeply appreciated. Lilian and everyone at Deaf History Scotland – thank you for your patience and your support. It’s a privilege to work with you. John Hay, Peter Jackson and Norma McGilp, too, thank you. Everyone at EdSign (especially Rachel O’Neill) and all the tutors and learners at the deaf literacy group (especially Fiona Stewart, for taking a punt on me!): you are all wonderful. Kamal, thank you for teaching me so much about English. Everyone at Celtic and Scottish Studies and the School of Scottish Studies Archives, you are incredible colleagues. Particular shout-outs to Christine Lennie ‘the Legend’, Caroline Milligan, Stuart Robinson (sorry for all the stupid questions!), Mark Mulhern, Colin Gately, Maggie Mackay, Cathlin Macaulay, and Arnot Macdonald (we miss you!). Thanks, too, to Donald Smith, the Scottish Storytelling Centre, Ruth Kirkpatrick, and all the storytellers who gave me their support. Immense thanks are owed to Graham Turner, Kyra Pollitt and the Ack Ack collectif, and Andy and Jemina (and Tilda!) for all the pep-talks and the input and the friendship. I couldn’t have got through it without you. Bryan, thank you in particular for proving that good fieldwork requires good friendship and providing me with constant and insightful mockery. You are a star. All my friends – ALL OF YOU – who got me though this: I can never thank you enough. There are far too many of you to list, but particular love goes to Mairi McFadyen, Laragh Horn (it’s all about the shimmering multi-coloured body), Yvonne Waddell, Kat Lloyd, Zarya Rathe, Chris Wright, Emily Nordmann, Lyle Milne, and Brenda Carey (who finally knows what I do). Michael: thank you for being there right at the start and right the end, for all the confetti bombs, and for being my place of greater safety. Finally, thank you always to my femme-ily: Mum and Georgia. We rock. I love you. 4 Contents List of illustrations 12 List of boxes 15 Abbreviations 16 Conventions 17 Conventions for sign languages 17 Handshape conventions 18 Conventions for spoken languages 19 CHAPTER ONE │ Introduction: an autochthonous language and culture overlooked 20 A starting point: a gap in the study of Scotland’s corp-oral traditions 20 Introducing the research questions 26 Signing-deaf culture: what it and what to call it? 32 A note on terminology 35 A bilingual-bicultural continuum 37 From deaf and dumb to linguistic and cultural minorities: signing-deaf communities in historical context 41 British Sign Language: the forgotten autochthonous language 42 How sign languages come into being 45 An aside: how sign languages work 47 Role-shift 48 Classifiers and the productive lexicon 48 Iconicity 50 The historical significance of schools 52 The significance of recognition 55 5 Storytelling and the deaf public voice 57 Biculturality and deaf public voice in three case-studies 60 Looking forward 62 CHAPTER TWO │ Writing the body: a reflexive methodology 65 On where I stood: the beginning of the story 68 Considering my approach: lessons from sign language studies and deaf studies 70 Critiquing the spade: the problem of interviews 72 Why not ethnography? On the process of digging 74 On beginning to dig 74 On being converted: a political awakening 76 On being human 77 Against raiding DEAFspace for data 79 The Case-studies: an overview of methods 80 Case-study 1: an inter-cultural and inter-modal translation 85 Case-study 2: a DVD series of signed-oral history narratives 87 Case-study 3: a platform storytelling group’s repertoire 89 Building bridges into the performance-texts 91 On writing and translating the body 94 The interviews 95 The performance-texts 97 Looking back and looking forward 102 6 CHAPTER THREE │ Conceptualising and contextualising signed-oral storytelling 104 That it’s a story anyone knows? The look of the performance-text 107 Re-wording the gap: the significance of ‘Signart’ 112 What is traditional in signed-oral traditions? 115 Everyday storytelling in signing-deaf communities 119 Storytelling between two worlds: setting the bicultural scene 121 Painting pictures in four dimensions: the storytelling affordances of BSL 124 “A good poem is like a good movie”: cinematographic signartistry 128 Acting, gesturology and the visual vernacular: an inter-cultural bridge? 132 Visual vernacular: an inter- and intra-cultural performance idiom? 133 Beyond language in performance 136 Positioning performance-texts: a signartistry continuum 137 Modelling signpower 139 Telling and performing biculturality: contextualising the case-studies 141 Handling English in translation: contextualising Case-study 1 142 Building the community through personal experience narratives: contextualising Case-study 2 147 Signart on and off stage: contextualising Case-study 3 152 Looking back and looking forward 164 CHAPTER FOUR │ Let them dig where we stand: translated stories from Scottish spoken-oral tradition 168 Case-study 1: BSL:UPTAKE and the deaf public voice 171 BSL:UPTAKE translations and the politics of the thing 176 From source to target: