"In-Class" Essay

The use of Oralism (aka the Oral method) and Sign language impact the deaf view of reality, in two separate and different ways. Oralism has a better realm of reality, on Earth, where not everyone knows how to use sign language, and not everyone is deaf, so communication is more difficult. Sign language has a better realm of reality on Eyeth (the name deaf people call a world where not one speaks, everyone just signs), where everyone uses Sign language to communicate, and everyone understand through that means of “speaking.”
The Sapir –Whorf Hypothesis applies to Deaf Culture in the way that deaf people communicate (sign language). The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, that different language patterns yield different patterns of thought is shown in Deaf Culture through the world they call “Eyeth.” In Eyeth, the deaf person only has to focus on the sign language, and doesn’t get caught up in reading lips, so that if someone speaks to them to quickly, they might miss something. Sign language is essentially different language, because it is different than speaking. Through Sapir-Whorf, deaf people who use only sign language may have a clearer understanding of what is trying to be said because there a specific for words, and there is a sign for each letter of the alphabet. If a deaf person was using Oralism, aka reading lips, and learning to speak, their patterns of thought would be different than sign language. If a deaf person were reading lips, they might miss a word and not understand the full meaning, the way they would if the conversation was being signed. Similarly, if a deaf person can read lips, and can speak coherently, a hearing person may treat the deaf person the same a hearing one, which could lead to things like speaking with his/her back to the deaf person, the way hearing people sometimes talk to each other, which would prevent the deaf person from understanding that part of the conversation, which changes the way the deaf person thinks about whatever the topic of conversation is.
Oralism and Signing facilitate, extend, direct or limit thinking in different way. Oralism is makes it easier for a deaf person to communicate with a hearing person, facilitating them by speaking, as best they can, and reading the hearing person’s lips, so that s/he does not have to sign. It also limits the thinking on both the deaf person and hearing person’s parts. The deaf person may be limited in how fast they can read lips, and so some words may get lost, which can skew the meaning the hearing person is trying to get across. The hearing person is limited in how they can communicate with the deaf person. It is almost rude to constantly rely on the other person to do so much work in holding a simple conversation. Signing both extends, and facilitates thinking. It is extended through hand-eye coordination, watching the hands sign, and replying almost instantaneously with one’s one signs. The better people can sign to each other, the more fluent the conversation becomes, and the more easily the conversation is understood. Signing facilitates thinking because specific signs can only mean certain things so it is easier to understand what is being said when one is holding a conversation in sign. However, signing can also limit thinking. If two people are conversing in sign, it makes it much harder for others to join the conversation, even those who can already sign because who ever wants to join the conversation must watch it carefully for a while to understand what is being discussed. This is basically impossible for any non-signing person to do. In Abel, Mill and Frege say that “the meaning of a sentence ought to depend only on the meaning of words that constitute it,” which basically is a sentence that says what it means, and has relevance to the context or makes sense. However, in language there are always colloquialisms and idioms, so the words don’t always have the meaning they traditionally have, and with signing, it is hard to express those, especially to a newly-signing person, which can make a conversation a) difficult to hold, and b) difficult to understand.
When the Deaf use the Oral method or Signing, what they know is different in each language. With the oral method, lip reading provides a direct meaning and so a deaf person can know what has just been said, although words may get lost, depending on how fast one speaks. Also, when a deaf person uses the Oral method to speak, they know that what they are saying can be understood by hearing people. With Signing, deaf people know exactly what is being said because there are specific signs for almost anything. Anything that doesn’t have a sign can easily be spelled out using the sign alphabet. Each “language,” however, does have a different framework of reality. On “Eyeth,” Deaf people communicate solely through sign, which isolates them from hearing people who cannot sign. It provides better communication among those who can sign, because they are focused solely on the signs and not through understanding fast-paced lips. Through sign, objects can be described better through referencing, therefore becoming more specific. If there is no specific sign for the word egg, a person signing can still describe what they had for breakfast, simply through referencing. It is possible for them to say (through signs of course) “This morning I had two of what a chicken lays, for breakfast.” It simply takes longer.
On Earth, where the oral method would be used more often, there is a sense, cultivated by Alexander Graham Bell, of eugenics, and “breeding” deafness out of the population. Using Oralism, and not sign, deaf people would be able to “mate and pro-create” with hearing people, which would hopefully (in the eyes of the eugenicists) breed out the undesirable trait of deafness. This frame of reality is a little off. Deafness is a mutation that is likely to reoccur, whether someone has two deaf parents or one, or none. It is unrealistic and horrible to keep deaf people separated from each other. In the documentary, families that have two deaf parents say that they found each other and connected better because they were deaf. If you isolate each deaf person, whether they can use the oral method or not, doesn’t prevent them from being lonely, and not having someone they can relate to. However, the Oral method is more realistic on Earth. It allows the deaf people to communicate with the hearing people, not only by reading lips, but also by the deaf speaking, so that their ideas may be conveyed as well.
Abel’s explanation of Sense and reference, sense is a description, and reference is that “which is what the words point to or designate,” play into how the Deaf might use Oralism or signing to view reality. According to the documentary, originally the deaf didn’t know what something was. Gaulledet tried to bring meaning to things and objects, and he did this by creating sign language, which gave the deaf community a way to express and communicate with each other. Sign language, gave both a sense and a reference to things so that they could properly be explained to deaf people. Through sign language, he could describe an object (sense), and then give it a name (reference), which helped deafs to understand the world better, and it gave them a better sense of reality, because they could look at something, know, what it was called, and actually describe it. Through the Oral method they could also do this and connect to hearing people, which kept them in touch with reality, because they had to communicate with people. Abel’s quote, “Though meanings require words, they are not identical to words,” means, in the context of the hearing and the deaf, that those who are able to understand the meaning of a words, and what that words stands in for (i.e. an object or idea), are better able to communicate with the world around them. “Linguistic symbols to organize experience,” means, in the context of the hearing and the deaf, that linguistic symbols, like Sign language, help to explain the things we experience around us, in different ways.
Implications of my claims are that it is possible for deaf and hearing peoples to communicate sufficiently, through both groups’ understanding of words and what they mean, and what they stand for. This, in theory, means that there should be perfect understanding and communication through all people. If hearing people learned to sign, and deaf people learned to read lips and speak, people would be able to understand each other much more clearly, and conversations would flow much more easily. The counterclaim to my argument is, of course, that the world does not work so perfectly. There will always be those who do not wish to learn to better communicate with others, that will leave it up to someone else to learn to sign, or to speak and read lips. There will always be those who do not wish to communicate with those who make no effort. Also, meanings of words are not always clear, which makes communication that much more difficult.
In conclusion, Oralism and Sign language are different capacities, for which different realities exist. Both have their strengths and weaknesses, and perhaps one way is better than another, although that should be based solely on opinion.