The Traditional Group Narrative of Deaf Children

Summer 1985 THE TRADITIONAL GROUP NARRATIVE OF DEAF CHILDREN Susan Rutherford When we were children trying to develop language meaningful to us, we invented many stories like this. -- My Third Eye, National Theater of the Deaf Folk traditions exist within any identifiable cultural group. These traditions, passed from generation to generation, survive for one basic reason: they continue to serve vital functions for the group. Among others, they help to define the culture and maintain the group's sense of identity. Perhaps most important for the purposes of this paper, they serve as an educating tool for the learning of cultural rules, values, and specific competence. This is true for the culture of Deaf people as for any other. Here I will first look briefly at the role that folk traditions play within a culture and then more closely examine a folk tradition that is widespread in the folk group of Deaf children, the group narrative.1 This examination is based on group narratives collected in context at the California School for the Deaf at Berkeley (now at Fremont): on in-studio video recording of storytelling sessions and interviews with Deaf children (age 8 to 10); on a recorded performance by the National Theater of the Deaf of an example of the genre; and on interviews with Deaf adults reflecting on their childhood experiences at various state schools for the deaf, among them New Jersey, California (Berkeley and Riverside), Kansas, Ohio, Oregon, and Washington. Beyond examining the form, I will explore the benefits of using traditional folk material such as the group narrative in the education of deaf children. The spontaneous folk play in group narrative provides an environment for two complementary phenomena: the learning of language in a social context, and the development of social competence in a linguistic context. Finally, by looking at one current storytelling 1 No one common term exists in the Deaf community for the storytelling form. The term "group narrative" is my suggestion for the purposes of this description. Q 1985 by Linstok Press, Inc. See inside front cover. ISSN 0302-1475 SLS 47 S.R. : 142 project that employs in the classroom the techniques of traditional signed group narrative, I will show the use of American Sign Language (ASL) elements and traditional group narrative style can act as powerful teaching tools in developing Deaf children's appreciation and mastery of English-based texts and the world view they contain. Folklore. It is unfortunate that in popular usage the term "folklore" often implies something that is not true or is wrong, or refers to traditions that are old and dying out. On the contrary, folklore is alive and well and continues to serve the needs and desires of the folk group. The term "folk" can apply to any group of people who share one common factor. It does not matter what that factor is: religion, occupation, nationality, language variety, or hobby. What is important is that the group will have traditions that it calls its own. These traditions help to maintain the group's sense of identity. Hence, a folk group could be as large as a nation (e.g. the United States with its tradition of Fourth of July picnics and parades), or as small as a family with special ways of observing someone's birthday. Much of a person's enculturation in this world occurs through folklore. It is such a close and integral part of our lives that we take it as much for granted as the air we breathe. Its functions in our lives are many: It amuses us, validates our culture, reaffirms our identity; and serves to maintain conformity to accepted patterns of behavior (Bascom 1965). And it educates us; through its various forms we gain knowledge in different areas. Through myth we learn of our relationship with nature and the supernatural. Through legend we learn of how things got to be the way they are. This can also provide us with a sense of history -- a sense that things evolve and that the past connects to the present and to ourselves. Through family stories and first-person reminiscences we also learn of our heritage, our heroes, and those...