Donde no hay Escuela/Where there is no School:
The Mexican Sign Language Network and Language Transmission across Generations
Claire Ramsey
University of California, San Diego
Fabiola Ruíz Bedolla
Instituto Pedagógico para Problemas de Lenguaje IAP
Poussin No. 63, Colonia San Juan Mixcoac,México, DF México
Problem
Sign languages confront risks that would lead to endangerment and extinction for spoken
languages. Nonetheless, some sign languages survive, even though they have few
recognized official functions, are intentional targets for extinction or replacement, and
may be excluded from educational functions. We are studying language transmission and
maintenance among elderly Mexico City signers, the ENS-Signers. In this community
risk-factors are extreme because sign-medium special education for deaf students has not
been dependably available since 1962 when La Escuela Nacional para Sordomudos
(National School for Deaf-Mutes or ENS) closed. Post-ENS education policies strongly
favor spoken Spanish-medium teaching, and integration of deaf with hearing students
without interpreters. Currently many young deaf people gain access to LSM outside
school contexts, very late, through intermittent contact with other deaf people or from
signing missionaries or priests (many of whom are hearing very late learners of LSM).
Objective of the Study
Our goal is to identify key social institutions (and signers) so that we can understand
ways that alternate routes of Mexican Sign Language (Lenguaje de Señas de México or
LSM) transmission are created, structured and maintained. Using research methods from
ethnographic network research and language surveys, we are tracing LSM distribution
within the ENS-Signers network, and its routes of transmission across generations. The
core of our study population consists of approximately 40 surviving ENS students and
their deaf spouses aged between 60 and 90 years. With the exceptions of native signers,
each of the ENS-Signers gained access to LSM by attending ENS or marrying a former
ENS student.
Method: Social Network, Life Histories, and LSM Samples
Our primary research tool is description of the ego-centered “full relational social
network” (Trotter, 1999) of ENS signers. Ego-centered networks are held together by
social, cultural and linguistic links, and are describable by traits such as size, duration and
density of relationships.
To gather information needed to represent the ENS-Network, we conducted surveys of
as many network members as we could locate.
To gather information about personal connections, and to gather samples of
extemporaneous narrative signing, we conducted open-ended life history interviews.
For LSM data to test hypotheses about variation over generations, and across groups, we
elicited samples of LSM classifiers using Brentari’s materials ((Crosslinguistic Study of
Sign Language Classifiers)
Results of the Investigation
The ENS Network consists of groups of signers who have limited contact with younger
generations of deaf people. The surviving ENS-Signers are elderly. (Several died in the
last year). Students tended to enter ENS when they were 10 – 12 years of age.
Accordingly, there are few native signers in this group, and many late-learners. ENSsigners have almost no contact with younger deaf people. Men are more likely to
socialize outside the home than women. Most ENS-Children and -Grandchildren are
hearing, and few transmit LSM to network outsiders. Most ENS-Children do not
transmit LSM to their own children (the ENS-Grandchildren).
Research In Progress
Additional Networks: We are surveying two additional groups of deaf people in Mexico
City to construct two additional networks of interest. The first includes Post-ENS
Schooled Signers, Deaf signers between the ages of 18 and 45 who did not attend ENS.
Most were “oralized” and attended (without support) schools with hearing students The
second includes Post-ENS Unschooled Signers (ages 18-45). Some members of this
group sign LSM, but others (called los ignorantes) use unconventional, idiosyncratic, or
no signs.
LSM Variation: We hypothesize that LSM is subject to much variation as a result of
interrupted, undependable, or difficult to access routes of transmission across generations
and other groups. To student the structural consequences of the Mexican sociolinguistic
situation, we are collecting, analyzing and comparing classifier form and use across all
generations and all groups.
Transition Network Longitudinal Study: This network is composed of a group of 15-17
year old Deaf students educated orally with limited success as children. They gained
access to LSM-medium instruction (with Deaf adult and native signing teachers at a
private school) in their early adolescence. We will trace their upcoming transition out of
primaria (grades 1-6). Little is known about Mexican deaf students who seek signmedium schooling. The post-school lives of those who manage to earn a primaria
certificate are undescribed to date. (Among hearing students, the end of grade six usually
marks the end of schooling. Nationally, 6.5 years is the average length of schooling in
Mexico).
References
Trotter, R. (1999). Friends, relatives, and relevant others: Conducting ethnographic
network studies. In Schensul, J. et al. Mapping social networks, spatial data, and hidden
populations. Walnut Creek: Altamira Press, 1-50.