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Apart from linguistic issues, the Chiying deaf people have a range of
opinions and attitudes where deafness is concerned. Most of the people with whom
I came in frequent contact had very early ties to a signed language. A majority
of them learned CSL first at the Chiying School, and when they went off to
middle school in Tainan, they learned TSL, which had long been the medium of
instruction in the public schools for the deaf in Taiwan. Their early contact
with a signed language notwithstanding, many of the Chiying deaf group hold
hearing people and their values as an ever present concern. A statement made to
me by Chiang Ssu Nung captured this idea. I had heard that Chiang believed that
CSL was a better language than JSL, and I was anxious to hear him articulate
this position. But my question seemed to bore him. “The best sign language,” he
said, “is the sign language which hearing people can easily understand.”
In contrast, many deaf people are indignant about some of the social and
economic issues they face. Indeed, some of the Chiying deaf people seem to have
developed a secure sense of themselves as human beings with every right to
inhabit the largely hearing world around them and to be beneficiaries of all it
has to offer.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This chapter was developed from a paper presented at the International Sixth
Conference of Theoretical Issues in Sign Language Research at Gallaudet
University in Washington, D.C., November, 1998. I could not have written it
alone. I gratefully acknowledge the assistance of the following people. Leila
Monaghan encouraged me to write this chapter and gave me anthropological
guidance in the form of many patient and helpful comments throughout the
process. Long Peng’s comments on the very underpinnings of the chapter changed
it for the better. Without a doubt, much of what we know about TSL and deaf life
in Taiwan, we know from Wayne Smith’s treasure trove of published and
unpublished work. He has shared all of his resources with me throughout the
years. The illustrations for the figures in this chapter are from Smith’s work
and are used by permission. Grants from the American Council of Learned
Societies, the American Association of University Women, and the University of
Arizona financed my work in Taiwan. With a great deal of help from Jane Tsay,
Jennifer Chiang, and Chiang Ssu Nung, I was able to arrange to live at the
Chiying School. Finally, the contributions that the deaf adults and children in
the Chiying School community of the early 1990s made to my work and to my life
is incalculable. I, alone, am responsible for any inaccuracies within this
chapter.