Deaf American Poetry: An Anthology

Footnote to Anthropological Linguistics I (Washoe No. 1)*

Loy E. Golladay 126 Footnote to Anthropological Linguistics I (Washoe No. 1)* When Ph.D.s taught Washoe how to sign And all her cousins—somewhere down the line Some chimpanzee (they said) will be so smart He’ll be the human genius counterpart. He’s sure to get here sometime, soon or late— So teach these monkeys to communicate! And, sure enough, there came upon the scene A monkey savant with a face serene, Bespectacled, benign. He went to Yale, Plus M.I.T. and Stanford (each detail Of all their knowledge fed into his brain By interpreters—let me here explain). At length this ape consented to digress From all his scholarship to meet the press. They crowded in with TV, pad and pen, From Gotham, Paris, Rome, and West Cheyenne, The newshawks tense, the newshens pert and pearled, All set to scoop a wan and waiting world. With Reasoner and Walters in the van, He spoke in S.E.E. and Ameslan:† “In search of selfish prestige, power and pelf, The man has made a monkey of himself. This theory of Darwin’s is the bunk, For clearly Man is father to the monk!” * Washoe, a chimpanzee captured in the wild in 1966, was the subject of anthropologists Allen and Beatrice Gardner’s study to demonstrate that another species could acquire human language. † S.E.E. refers to Signing Exact English, an artificial communication system that uses modified ASL signs in English word order. Ameslan was a popular abbreviation for American Sign Language. ...