INTRODUCTION American Sign Language (ASL), the U.S. Census collects data on individuals with language used by signing Deaf people in hearing loss, it does not distinguish between the United States and Canada, has a rich signing and non-signing deaf people. Addi- history.1 Like spoken languages, sign lan- tionally, many hearing people learn ASL guages develop as a result of regular and sus- as a first language (children of deaf adults tained contact between groups of individu- or CODAs) or learn and use it regularly as als, in this case, individuals who cannot hear. adults (e.g., family members, friends, teach- Contrary to popular belief, sign languages ers, and interpreters). We do know, however, are not universal. Each one is shaped by the that Deaf people have steadily carved out a people who use it, the environment in which space for themselves in the American main- it emerges, and the distinct experience of stream so that it is no longer unusual to see interacting with the world primarily through them on television, at public events, and in sight. ASL offers a treasure trove of histori- places of employment. They work in all sec- cal relics from America’s past that are stored tors of the economy, attend institutions of within the forms and meanings of its signs. higher learning, raise children, and partici- Because Deaf people are most often born pate in their communities. Many universities into hearing families, the language and and even high schools now include ASL as a culture that develops naturally among them foreign language (though it is as indigenous is typically passed down outside the nuclear to the U.S. as English). Interpreter Prepara- family.2 In many ways, the American Deaf tion Programs have sprouted all over the community resembles an ethnic minority country in response to the legally mandated group. Yet, unlike other minorities, members access afforded Deaf and hearing people who of the Deaf community are characterized need to communicate with each other. With by a shared language and by a disability. As the advent of videophones and federally a result, the dichotomy between a cultural funded video relay services, Deaf and hear- view of deafness as an element of identity ing people are now able to make phone calls and a pathological view as a defect that to each other through interpreters who use needs to be fixed is ever-present. ASL, English, and in some cases, Spanish. As The exact number of people who use ASL a result, Deaf people have a greater degree is difficult to quantify (Mitchell, Young, of access to the mainstream than ever before Bachleda, and Karchmer 2006 ). Though the and ASL is beginning to be recognized as one part of the diverse linguistic makeup of 1. In accordance with convention, we will use “Deaf” the U.S. to refer to Deaf people who sign and identify themselves The increase in access to the mainstream with a cultural community and “deaf” to refer to audiologi- has unavoidably precipitated a shift in the cal status. 2. Mitchell and Karchmer (2004) found 94 –96% of deaf ethos of the Deaf community. Because deaf- children in the U.S. are born to hearing parents. ness is a low-incidence disability that affects ix only a fraction of a percent of most popula- and Dumb (now, American School for the tions, schools for Deaf children were at one Deaf, henceforth ASD) resulted from the time primarily residential; students boarded partnership of three men—Mason Fitch during the school year and returned home Cogswell, a hearing American doctor and on weekends and holidays. The physical father of a deaf child; Thomas Hopkins concentration of Deaf children and adults Gallaudet, a hearing American reverend; allowed for the rapid development and and Laurent Clerc, a Deaf French educator. transmission of the culture and language. Gallaudet and Clerc’s collaboration marked Today, mainstreaming has become the norm, the beginning of formalized deaf education resulting in fewer opportunities for the inter- as well as the importation of French Sign generational exchange needed to pass down Language ( Langue des Signes Française or ASL. The profusion of cochlear implant LSF ) to this continent. Clerc had attended surgeries in young children coupled with the the historic school in France (now, the Insti- chasm between Deaf adults and non-signing tut National de Jeunes Sourds, henceforth hearing parents has led to fewer children INJS) founded in 1791 to carry on the legacy learning ASL. Most Deaf clubs, once the hub of Abbé Charles Michel de l’Épée. De l’Épée of social life for adults, have closed. Remote opened the first school to educate Deaf chil- interactions via videophones and text mes- dren using signs, in 1760 in Paris, France, saging have allowed for frequent contact in and he is still heralded across the world as lieu of personal visits. the father of deaf education. Many lament these changes as indications Establishing ASD was momentous in of a dying culture, while others view them as many respects, but the one most relevant a reinvention of what it means to be Deaf in to this work is that it created a place where the twenty-first century. The constant is that Deaf Americans could regularly interact the community continues to evolve along using a sign language, one that happened to with its language. While the history of ASL be heavily influenced by LSF. Deaf children might seem irrelevant to these contemporary born into hearing families prior to the estab- transformations, we see it as even more cru- lishment of ASD were isolated, had restricted cial to edifying Deaf people’s place in Ameri- access to communication within their own can society. Signs are steeped in history and families, and limited (if any) interactions ASL is a product of American culture—an with other Deaf people. ASD and the other amalgam of influences both foreign and residential schools that followed became a domestic. By looking deeply into the etymol- second home where they were able to learn ogy of this language, we can expose relics of to sign, interact with peers and adults who a cultural past that are furtively embedded in were also Deaf, and become accustomed to contemporary signs. a visually oriented way of life. Some Deaf people had been signing in isolated pockets across the U.S. well before the opening of Signs Have a History ASD, but it was not until the founding of this school that ASL as it is known today began The story of how the Deaf community and to be standardized. ASL came to be usually begins with the Gallaudet did not know sign language founding of the first American school for before meeting Clerc, but Clerc was flu- deaf children in Hartford, Connecticut in ent in LSF and taught it to Gallaudet. Very 1817. The American Asylum for the Deaf little is known about just what variety of x introduction sign language Gallaudet, Clerc, and the first Martha’s Vineyard generations of students used; no documents describing signs were published in the U.S. The first group of settlers came from until the late nineteenth century. However, Massachusetts to the island of Martha’s it is in the early nineteenth century where Vineyard in 1644. Originally from England, we find the origins, or etymology, of much they continued to move to the island for the of the language’s lexicon. Previous studies next seventy years, and the first deaf person of historical change have only scratched arrived on the island in 1694. For several the surface of this connection. Now, almost generations, a disproportionately large two hundred years later, the history of ASL’s number of genetically deaf children were lexicon and its link to LSF are finally coming born, raised, and remained on the island, to light. and the entire population of the island used a sign language (Groce 1985). The first three students from Martha’s The Birth of ASL Vineyard to attend ASD—Mary Smith, Sally Smith, and Lovey Mayhew—were admitted According to the 1887 Annual Report of in 1825, seven years after the school opened. the directors of ASD (Annual Report 1887), No more than four students from Martha’s the population of 77 students who attended Vineyard were present at ASD at the same the school in its first two years came from time until the 1850s and 1860s, when their diverse backgrounds. Most were older than attendance peaked at around twelve students sixteen and had never used sign before. (Annual Report 1887). Since some of the first Clerc’s historic role in the founding of ASD generations of ASD students were from the meant that LSF was both introduced to and island, it is likely that a number of Martha’s used by this nascent Deaf community. We Vineyard Sign Language ( MVSL) signs were can deduce that Clerc’s dialect reflected the incorporated into ASL, though probably less areas from which he came, including the than is typically assumed. Bahan and Nash municipal community of Paris where he was (1996 ) analyzed data collected from Nash’s educated but also regions outside of Paris great-grandmother, a hearing resident of the where he and many of the first students at island who knew MVSL. Nash documented INJS grew up. His language was also strongly approximately 300 signs and found roughly influenced by Signed French, a methodical 20 percent of them had cognates in ASL. code that de l’Épée invented to map signs in While it is certainly possible that some of French grammatical order.