Imagine having no capacity for language acquisition. Imagine developing a language with grammars that are completely independent from the spoken language of the surrounding hearing culture.
Imagine being unable to engage in any of the thought processes I'm using right now: Choosing words, and bundles of words, to convey meaning, and pausing to ponder the interesting similarities between deafness and deficit; or grabbing for a phrase like "language acquisition" and appreciating the neat little package it represents.
How different would you be? Would you be able to relate to things, even things that don't really require words? Do we laugh at slapstick for what it is, or are there underlying substructures of feeling and understanding that were created through language?
We explore that kind of thing this hour, as we examine and imagine frontiers where language simply does not exist.
I've been thinking about this ever since reading The Silent History, an unusual novel about people who can't speak, read, or write. More than anything, the book shows how deeply people are locked into language as a means to communicate. It's so difficult to understand a world without words, that we block the signals sending us massive amounts of non-verbal communication every day.
We talk to the co-author of The Silent History, a professor who works with children who are deaf and make their own language, and children with no pre-existing language, and a mime who uses silence to help people communicate.
***This originally aired on June 25th, 2014***
What do you think? Comment below, email Colin@wnpr.org, or tweet @wnprcolin.
GUESTS:
- Eli Horowitz is the coauthor of several books, most recently, The Silent History with Matthew Derby and Kevin Moffett. Previously, he was the managing editor and publisher of McSweeney’s for eight years
- Marie Coppola is an assistant professor of psychology and linguistics at the University of Connecticut. She's the founder and Executive Director of Manos Unidas
- Bill Bowers is a world renowned mime and actor who studied under the legendary Marcel Marceau. He’s performed at The Kennedy Center, The White House, and on Broadway in “The Lion King” and “The Scarlet Pimpernel”