The Deaf: Their Position in Society and the Provision for Their Education in the United StatesBest, Harry
History
The Deaf: Their Position in Society and the Provision for Their Education in the United States
Best, Harry
Deaf -- Education -- United States; Deaf -- United States
Eugenics also will be looked to for help, and it may in time bring to
light much that is now hidden from our ken. As yet our knowledge of the
causes of deafness from birth is very imperfect. A small part may be
ascribed to consanguineous marriages, and a larger part to the marriages
of those whose families are affected with deafness, these perhaps not
being wholly distinct, and together comprising a little over half of
congenital deafness. Marriages of relatives, even though not of frequent
occurrence so far as deafness is affected, have a relation to it which
is not to be ignored. Intermarriages of the deaf themselves are not
found for the most part to result in deaf offspring; while the
likelihood of such is not always greater when both parents are deaf than
when one is deaf and the other hearing. The one distinct fact of which
we seem altogether certain in this matter is that when there is in the
parent congenital deafness, or especially when there are deaf relatives
concerned, the chances are vastly increased of deaf offspring. These are
the danger signals, and not to be passed without heed. As to that form
of deafness occurring when consanguinity and antecedent deafness are not
involved, we are in greater ignorance. For most of it, however, we may
believe that there is inherited some strain or influence predisposing to
deafness; and that in the discovery and application of eugenic
principles a greater or less portion will be eliminated.
Though, so far as is discernible from the immediate prospect, we cannot
look to an early disappearance of deafness from the race, there are
indications at present that deafness is tending to become less. The
probabilities are that the future will be able to report advance, and so
far as the ultimate results are concerned, we have no reason to be other
than hopeful.
In respect to what has been accomplished for the deaf since America has
become concerned in them, we have a record that may well be a distinct
cause of pride. The work for the deaf in America is hardly a hundred
years old. Yet in that time there has transpired what, without violence
being done to language, can be called a revolution. A century ago the
deaf were practically outside the pale of human thought and activities.
They were in a measure believed to be without reason, and were little
less than outcasts in society. To-day they have become active
components of the state, possessed of education, on a level with their
fellow-men nearly everywhere in the scale of human employment, capable
of all the responsibilities of life, and standing in the full stature of
citizenship.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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