Signing the Body Poetic: Essays on American Sign Language Literature

by H-Dirksen L. Bauman (Editor)

This unique collection of essays, accompanied by videos, at last brings a dazzling view of the literary, social, and performative aspects of American Sign Language to a wide audience. The book presents the work of a renowned and diverse group of deaf, hard-of-hearing, and hearing scholars who examine original ASL poetry, narrative, and drama. The videos showcases the poems and narratives under discussion in their original form, providing access to them for hearing non-signers for the first time. Together, the book and videos provide new insight into the history, culture, and creative achievements of the deaf community while expanding the scope of the visual and performing arts, literary criticism, and comparative literature.

The videos may be viewed online at  .

Genres: Nonfiction, Poetry, Linguistics

292 pages, Paperback

First published December 20, 2006

About the author

Dr. Dirksen Bauman received degrees in English from Colorado College (BA 1985), University of Northern Colorado (MA 1989), and Binghamton University, State University of New York (PhD, 1998) where his dissertation explored ASL poetry within the context of 20th century American poetics. He taught English at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf for two years (1994-1996). Dirksen then moved to Gallaudet University where he taught in the Department of English for 3 years. In 1999, he was hired to teach in the Deaf Studies department. He has published articles on ASL literature, autobiographical practices, audism and bioethics. He is the co-editor of the book/DVD project, Signing the Body Poetic: Essays in American Sign Language Literature with Jennifer Nelson and Heidi Rose (U of California P, 2006) and editor of Open Your Eyes: Deaf Studies Talking (U of Minnesota P, 2008), and co-editor of Deaf Gain: Raising the Stakes for Human Diversity (U of Minnesota P, 2014) with Joseph Murray. He is coauthor of Transformative Conversations: A Guide to Mentoring Communities among Colleagues in Higher Education (Jossey-Bass, 2013) He is also a producer and co-director of the film (with Ben Bahan and Facundo Montenegro) of Audism Unveiled. He currently serves as Department Chair.

Reviews

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written. Highly informative. I’ve enjoyed it so much that it’s still in my library 15 years after college.

[Mohit Joshi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm grateful and glad that I read this book.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm giving this book three stars because of the whole world of Deaf theater, poetry and performance I was introduced to in it. Yes, there is a whole world of it out there, and I wish I could see a performance in person. It's a fascinating part of the Deaf culture, and it deserves recognition. It can serve as a bridge between the hearing world and the Deaf world.
Now, that that's out of the way, I can say that the author is endlessly Deaf-centric. Hearing people are categorized as being willfully misunderstanding, prejudiced, uncaring, forceful, etc, etc. Although there are hearing people who look down on the Deaf and hard of hearing, they are far less common than the author seems to believe. Being a person with bilateral severe hearing loss, I have found far more people who are understanding and sympathetic in the hearing world. You can't expect hearing people to have instant respect for Deaf people and their culture, if you automatically assume they are somehow predisposed to being against Deaf people. It's a two way street of respect between two cultures.

[Jessica · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was really the first collection of scholarly essays on ASL Literature, and it's wonderful. Most of the essays are accessible to a wide audience and it comes with a DVD that makes the visual beauty and complexity of literary ASL obvious even to non-signers. Bahan's contribution is a great, quick and easy overview of the "genres" in ASL Literature (though poetry is notably and inexplicably absent from his list.) Those with a background in the field will find it useful too, as a reference, and as a source for research ideas. Most essays, especially Bauman's, and the interview with Peter Cook, leave the reader with epiphanies and an eagerness to ask more questions and figure out the answers.

[Julia Hall · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book highly informative and absolutely loved it. I read it for a college class and had such an easy time writing about it because there was so much to write about!