Illusions of Equality: Deaf Americans in School and Factory 1850-1950

Robert M Buchanan

The residential schools for deaf students established in the nineteenth century favoured a bilingual approach to education that stressed the use of American Sign Language while also recognizing the value of learning English. But the success of this system was disrupted by the rise of oralism, with its commitment to teaching deaf children speech and its ban of sign language. Buchanan depicts the subsequent ramifications in sobering terms: most deaf students left school with limited educations and abilities that qualified them for only marginal jobs. He also describes the insistence of the male hierachy in the deaf community on defending the tactics of individual responsibility through the end of World War II, a policy that continually failed to earn job security for Deaf Workers. Hardback 214 pages 2002

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