Deaf and Disability Studies: Interdisciplinary Perspectives

“We Are of a Different Class”

5 “We Are of a Different Class” Ableist Rhetoric in Deaf America, 1880–1920 Tavian Robinson Keywords Ableism; Activism; Audism; Class; Education; History; Identity; Language; Organizations; Science and Technology In 1896 an article in a deaf newspaper asserted deaf people’s normalcy, affirming that “in every respect except the one particular of having their ears closed, [the deaf are] the same as other people.”1 Like this anonymous author, deaf leaders regularly sought to emphasize that their peers only lacked the sense of hearing but were otherwise “normal.” By the late nineteenth century, many community elites shared this sentiment, explicitly resisting notions of deaf people’s defectiveness while accepting ableist ideas about other people with disabilities. Deaf leaders often responded to ableist discrimination by internalizing then applying ableist values onto other deaf and disabled people. Partly as a result of this history, deaf studies scholars primarily have examined and celebrated deaf people’s distinct cultural history, and disability studies scholars have rarely integrated deaf subjects in their work. Yet significant issues, such as ableism, inextricably link both groups. Ableism historically has pervaded deaf elites’ views and representations of deaf culture as well as the ways deaf people have sought to empower their community. This essay will examine the period from 1880 to 1920, focusing on several key sites of activism in deaf history: education, employment, and representation. By considering deaf cultural leaders’ ableist attitudes and the ways the community has used ableist ideas to accomplish its goals, this work explains the meaning 6 Tavian Robinson of citizenship and of ableism at the turn of the century as well as why deaf and disability histories often seem at odds.2 Education was one important means for deaf people to assert their rights and ensure their place in American society. Deaf advocates argued since the early 1800s that education provided deaf people with the resources to be politically active and engaged citizens.3 Thomas F. Fox, a deaf teacher, cast schooling as a partial “cure” for deafness, which he viewed as a comparatively minor affliction. “With the favoring circumstances of an education and good manners,” he asserted in 1880, “the misfortune of deafness diminishes in its magnitude, till it takes its place among the many ills of life, which, since they cannot be remedied, must be borne with patience and fortitude.”4 Good character accrued through good education, Fox implied , dissolved the differences between deaf and nondeaf people, and in the process “normalized” deafness. Throughout the discourse within the deaf community regarding deafness, the attitude was often that deafness in itself was minor whereas the possession of other disabilities served as a barrier to access, employment, full citizenship, and hence “normalcy.”5 Educators emphasized English-language literacy in deaf education. Literacy as both a practical skill and symbol of enlightened citizenship became a defining feature of elite deaf identity between 1880 and the 1920s. Literacy especially mattered to deaf people, opening access to most features of mainstream society as well as facilitating relationships among other deaf people and between deaf and hearing citizens. Some leaders, such as Alice Terry, argued that applying literacy skills through various means was vital for the overall success of deaf people. Practice in the printing trades, for example, promoted “a taste for reading” and consequently “their language is improved and their general knowledge is broadened to a great extent.”6 In the minds of many deaf people, English-language literacy connoted intelligence and normalcy. Such fluency in English helped deaf people “pass” as nondisabled, particularly distancing deaf people from those who appeared most threatening at this time: the “feebleminded” (the term then used to describe people with cognitive and developmental disabilities as well as other people deemed inherently defective). The rise of the eugenics movement, which evaluated living creatures based on hierarchical notions of inherent biological worth, villified the “feebleminded” through both rhetoric and policies.7 “We Are of a Different Class” 7 The specter of the “feebleminded” also cast a dangerous shadow on deaf people, since communication barriers and misdiagnoses of deafness often led doctors and others to group deaf people with individuals with cognitive and developmental disabilities. As historian Susan Burch has argued, deaf people (and particularly deaf people of color) who emerged from deaf schools with an inadequate education and limited communication skills were vulnerable to accusations of mental inferiority or mental illness by hearing people.8 Clearly aware of these threats...