Library Collections: Document: Full Text

It was probably owing, originally, to the existence of a class of rational beings without an audible language, that the discovery was made, of a means of communication to a certain extent copious, universally intelligible among men. Otherwise, we might look with surprise upon the chaos of gestures, (for so it seems to a stranger,) employed by deaf-mutes, when we recollect how often this has been named to us, as that very language which all mankind are to understand at sight.

The extent to which the language of action may be perfected is almost limitless. As it is, after all, in the countenance, that the chief significancy of its signs exists, continued practice may render the use of the hands almost wholly unnecessary. To this extent did Mr. Gallaudet, the late accomplished principal of the American Asylum, succeed in carrying it; as he has stated in a former number of this magazine. But this success, however it may demonstrate the power and variety of expression of which the human countenance is capable, cannot be received as evidence of the power of natural signs. It is now more than three years, since the writer, their connected with the American Asylum, borrowing the felicitous idea of Mr. Gallaudet, himself attempted numerous and satisfactory experiments of a similar description. He became convinced, however, that the expressions of the countenance, and the slight motions of the head and body, necessary in this mode of communication, serve to recall common colloquial signs, of which they are, in fact, a kind of reduction of the second degree, a partial, or exceedingly abridged imitation; and, moreover, that certain independent conventions, unknown to the common dialect, are absolutely essential to success. He has seen experiments of the same kind conducted by another gentleman, very expert in the use of the sign-language, with the same result. Thus a stranger, though himself deaf and dumb, and acquainted with the common dialect, prevalent where the experiment is made, would probably find this species of sign-making unintelligible.

In this connection, the writer is reminded of another of Mr. Gallaudet's beautiful ideas, which, with the assistance of one of his associates, he has endeavored to reduce to practice. From the vocabulary of the English language are selected a number of words, of which the initial letters are designedly the several letters of the alphabet. These words are the names of passions, emotions, or mental operations; and their corresponding expressions in the countenance are regarded as signs of the initial letters merely; thus forming an alphabet of the countenance, or an alphabet of expression. A few letters are, of necessity, arbitrarily supplied. By means of this alphabet, any word whatever may be spelled to a deaf-mute to whom it is familiar, slowly, it is true, but as certainly, as with the manual alphabet. It is, of course, mere matter of curiosity and amusement, being susceptible of no useful application in practice.

The language of an institution, once established, commonly remains tolerably constant. Each pupil brings with him, on his arrival, the signs of reduction which he has been accustomed to employ among his friends. But he readily lays aside his own signs for those of the community; nor, in doing this, is his memory burthened with a load, like that of a new vocabulary to a person possessing speech. For the signs of reduction which stand for the same idea, come usually from the same extended description, however they may appear to differ; and the new comer has merely to substitute one form of abbreviation for another. Until he has thus fallen into the use of the prevalent dialect, it will be necessary to employ, in his instruction, only those signs which are purely natural.

Having endeavored to explain, in some degree, the nature of the elements, which make up the language of action under the second form, our attention is next directed to the law of combination, according to which these elements may be made to enunciate propositions. This is very simple. The language of action, when so comprehensive as to be really self-explanatory, being little else than the portraying of objects and incidents in the air, as a painter would represent them on canvass; we must forget that it is a language which we are considering, we must cast utterly aside the notions of syntax stereotyped in our minds, and regard simply the question, "Were I a painter, how should I depict this thing, in order most satisfactorily to exhibit, at once, the relations of its parts, and the progress of events." This is the key to the whole matter. Suppose I should wish actually to paint a proposition of this simplicity: "A man kicks a dog." I should begin naturally with the dog, and afterwards represent the man in the act of kicking. To paint first this act, to exhibit a man kicking the air, would be unnatural. So in the language of action: I must first make the sign of the dog, and assign to it a location. I must then make the sign of a man, giving it also a suitable location, and finally represent the action (by actually performing it) as passing in the proper direction between the two. With this illustration, we will leave the sign-language under the second or colloquial form.