Dr Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) was an English poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, literary critic, sermonist, biographer, editor, and lexicographer, and his writings have lasted the test of time. He has been called “the most distinguished man of letters in English history” (The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography). His most notable work is “A Dictionary of the English Language” (1755), though he was a prolific writer in every expression of the craft.
Based on biographies by those who knew him, such as his friend, James Boswell, his mannerisms and behaviours were so well documented that a posthumous diagnosis of Tourette’s Syndrome can be attributed to him. The most famous portrait of Johnson is the one above, painted by Joshua Reynolds, with whom he founded The Literary Club in 1764. The club would meet regularly, and included members from the literary and historical disciplines; membership was by unanimous election only; if a nominee was undesirable, a member could submit a black ball (white and black balls were likely deposited in an urn to keep the vote confidential). The term “to blackball someone” arose in 1770, and it means “to exclude from a club by adverse votes”. It may have originated at this club or simply have been a general practice employed in clubs and societies around this time.
So, without further ado, here are 10 quotes by Dr Johnson:
“I know not, Madam, that you have a right, upon moral principles, to make your readers suffer so much.”
“I never desire to converse with a man who has written more than he has read.”
“It is better to live rich than to die rich.”
“No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned. … A man in a jail has more room, better food and commonly better company.” (Boswell’s Life of Johnson)
“The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”
“The use of travelling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are.”
“Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.”
“In order that all men may be taught to speak truth, it is necessary that all likewise should learn to hear it.”
“When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.”
“The superiority of some men is merely local. They are great because their associates are little.”
If you’re like me, you might come across a good quote and not think any further about the name attached to it; did that person really say that? I’ve seen quotes attributed to one person but which I know were actually said or written by someone else. Sometimes, a quote is drawn from someone’s writings, letters, essays, or journals from the past. Now, with the dawn of AI upon us, algorithms begin to feed off of their own creations—whether the first effort was accurate or not—which in turn disseminates falsehoods so frequently that most people begin to believe them. It’s important now more than ever that we pay attention and use discernment; don’t believe everything you see or read, but test it. This image is a classic case in point:
So who was Alan Ashley-Pitt? “He” was, in fact, a name made up by a greeting card and poster company headquartered in Santa Barbara, CA, in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The company needed a name to quote for the sayings made up by employees for their cards, decorations, and posters. Though the company was out of business by 1974, many of its creations live on in the Ashley-Pitt quotations. In a way, it’s ironically fitting that a made-up persona’s quote should be imposed on the AI-generated image (below); unfortunately, the AI programs I tried couldn’t grasp the concept of a fork in the road with a crowd on one road and a lone man on the other. It just goes to show you that the human imagination is more creative and able to grasp abstract concepts better than any AI… so far!
Here’s another gem from my recently re-discovered “bits & bobs”: These are actual maintenance complaints submitted by USAF pilots and replies from maintenance crews:
Problem: Left inside main tire almost needs replacement.
Solution: Almost replaced left inside main tire.
Problem: Test flight OK, except autoland very rough.
Solution: Autoland not installed on this aircraft.
Problem: Something loose in cockpit.
Solution: Something tightened in cockpit.
Problem: Evidence of hydraulic leak on right main landing gear.
Solution: Evidence removed.
Problem: Friction locks cause throttle levers to stick.
Solution: That’s what they’re there for.
Problem: Number three engine missing.
Solution: Engine found on right wing after brief search.
The idiom “Catch-22” comes from a book of the same title by American author Joseph Heller (1923-1999). The term originally referred to a military rule whose provisions are mutually frustrating. Heller used Catch-18 instead of Catch-22 when the first chapter of his book was originally published in 1955. He changed it by the time the entire book was published in 1961 because his publisher had already published a book that year with “18” in the title (Leon Uris’ novel, Mila 18). So in 1961, the phrase Catch-22 first appeared. It was first used figuratively in 1971 in Atlantic Monthly magazine. As far as the form goes, it is usually hyphenated and with a capital C, as that is the way Heller originally wrote it.
Since the author’s first usage of the idiom, it has taken on a life of its own: Today, its broader meaning is a paradoxical situation from which an individual cannot escape because of contradictory rules or limitations. It has also been used as a mnemonic for the symptoms of DiGeorge syndrome.
One particular quote from Heller is thought-provokingly insightful: “Everyone in my book accuses everyone else of being crazy. Frankly, I think the whole society is nuts – and the question is: What does a sane man do in an insane society?” In a way, this is perhaps an example of a Catch-22 for the sane person: If they stay in an insane society, they may lose their sanity; but by leaving such a society, they throw away any chance of bringing it back to a state of reason. Social and political polarisation are both poisons that infect society.
Throughout history, languages have come and gone; an estimated 30,000 have existed at some point in time, though currently, there are roughly 6,000 to 7,000 languages in use – and most are threatened with extinction. Think about that. The impact on the loss of cultural history, connection to ways of thinking, ways of communicating, and ways of processing information; senses of humour, and national heritages will be lost.
An example of a language nearly lost, but which is now familiar to most of us by sight, is the logogram language of Egyptian hieroglyphs. The knowledge of how to interpret the symbols had been lost for centuries, until 1799, when a stone was found near Rosetta, along the Nile Delta in Egypt; the stone was a stele with a decree issued in 196 BC; the texts carved into the stone were Ancient Egyptian (“demotic” text), hieroglyphs, and Ancient Greek. Because Greek was a known language, they could use the Rosetta stone to decipher the forgotten languages.
When we think of writing, we may think of various alphabets: Greek, Roman (of which English makes use), Norse Runes, or the logographic or ideographic languages of Asia, such as Chinese or Japanese, or the cuneiform writing of the Ancient Near East. But did you know that there have been languages based on string?
Quipu in the Museo Machu Picchu, Casa Concha, Cusco. Source: Wikipedia
The Inca people, in the region of modern Peru and Chile, used knots on an elaborate system of connected strings or cords for collecting data, keeping records, recording taxes or census records, making calendars, or for military organisation. When the Spanish Conquistadors swept through, they found numerous bundles of strings, but had no idea of their significance; they destroyed many of the quipu*, not realizing that they might have held in their hands a record of an individual’s wealth in animals or crops. [*Quipu is the Spanish spelling used in English; it is also spelled khipu or kipu.] Other cultures have also used similar concepts with knotted strings to record information, unrelated to South America; these include China, Japan, Taiwan New Zealand, Hawaii, and other parts of Polynesia.
As with most textiles, they unfortunately didn’t stand the test of time very well, and only a fraction remains today. The ancient world may have taken the concept of the quipu one step further in creating the more flexible abacus, though the latter was (and is still) used for temporary calculations, while the former was rather for recording information. Whether or not there is a historical link, both are visual tools that can be used for similar functions to a certain extent.
Even with such widespread use of these knotting records, their meaning was nearly lost, until a Harvard student, Manny Madrano, had time on his hands one summer and solved a centuries-old mystery!
For an interesting video on this topic, please click here. I hope you’ve learned something! Keep being curious about our fascinating world!
The baroque town of Solothurn, though only an hour away from our home, was unfamiliar to us until my husband and I took a day trip this week. It has a beautiful historical centre and is known as the “city of elevens”: It was the 11th canton to join the Swiss Confederation; there are 11 towers in the fortification walls of the city; there are 11 churches and chapels, and 11 historical fountains throughout the city; the stairs leading up to the St. Ursus Cathedral have landings every 11 steps; the cathedral itself has 11 altars and 11 bells; the local brewery, producing an eponymous beer, is even called Oeufi – which is a Swiss dialectical word for eleven. 11:00 is the most “auspicious” time to set appointments in the town, and there is even a clock, hanging on the wall of a local bank, which is segmented into 11 hours; it has 11 cogs and 11 bells, which are chimed by a metalwork sculpture of a harlequin on the hours of 11:00, 12:00, 17:00 and 18:00. The bells chime to the tune of the city’s unofficial anthem, the Solothurner Lied.
Solothurn’s history dates back to the palaeolithic era, and its Roman era is dated to around AD 15-25; it was first mentioned in AD 219 as vico saloduro, and may have referred to a Celtic settlement, possibly meaning “Salo’s fort/stronghold”. In the Battle of Sempach, July 1386, the Habsburgs attacked Solothurn; it was a decisive Swiss victory, and even more importantly, it helped to solidify the loosely allied Swiss Confederation cantons into a more unified nation and is seen as a turning point in the growing strength of Switzerland as a nation. Today, it is largely bypassed by tourists due to its proximity to Bern, the Swiss capital, so it remains a hidden gem.
Another interesting clock is the clock tower, the “Zeitglockenturm”, a tower built in 1152 and first mentioned as a “clock tower” in 1406. If you look closely, you’ll see typical rain spouts coming off of the corners of the tower’s spire and roof, shaped like dragon’s heads. The 24-hour astronomical clock was built by Lorenz Liechti and Joachim Habrecht in 1545. The sun and moon hands both run counterclockwise; the moon makes one complete rotation every 27 days, while the sun makes one complete rotation every 365 days.
According to the Roter Turm website, there’s a humorous story connected to the upper, 12-hour clock: By 1753 the hour hand and the bells were no longer in sync; a commission contacted the watchmaker Niklaus Pfluger, reminding him of his gild’s oath, i.e. his responsibility to correct the clock. He suggested to the local government council that they add a minute hand; but minutes were not so important in the 18th century, apparently – they told him to leave it as it had always been. He took matters into his own hands (I guess it was easier to ask for forgiveness than permission…) and in 1756, he added a minute hand. He justified it as the “warning hand of God” – but he made it smaller, less noticeable than the hour hand, so on this clock, the small hand shows the minutes, not the hours.
Because the clock tower was built and added to over time, you’ll see four dates on the full image of the tower: 1411 and 2022 on the highest, 12-hour clock; and 1545 and 1883 on the central tableau; the latter dates usually refer to restorations.
The three figures in the central tableau above the clock are a knight, king, and skeleton (Death), which perform every hour: The knight holds a battleaxe in his right hand, and a sword in his left; every quarter-hour, he turns his head toward Death and strikes his breast, signifying his loyalty to the central figure, the king. On the right stands Death; in its right hand is a hourglass, which is turned on the hour, symbolizing the contradictions of life – good, bad, life, death. In the other hand is an arrow, showing that one could be struck down at any moment. On the hour, its head turns toward the knight.
On the throne between these two figures is the king: In his right hand is a sceptre, which he lifts on the hour. His jaw moves in rhythm with the hour hand, and his beard represents wisdom. However, notice that he’s wearing red and white fool’s garb: If the king does not rule with wisdom and the humour of a fool, his reign will become a tyranny. It tells us that life should have moments of both wisdom and a jester’s humour.
While Death announces the hours, the king swings his sceptre. At the same time, Death nods with each stroke and confirms the relentless passing of the hours. The king with his fool’s garb reminds us of the memento mori. When death or illness reigns, even the power of a wise king can do little (Solothurn was hit by the plague, e.g. in 1348). Though the Freudian era banished death from contact with the living in many Western cultures, death personified as a skeleton is still a symbol seen in many countries around the world. Having death constantly before your eyes encourages you to savour each moment of life.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief glimpse into a beautiful city with an ancient history!
Recently, my mother sent me a link on Facebook and asked me to write an article about it; it’s definitely an interesting topic – so thanks, Mom!
First of all, for those of you who don’t know what a folly is:
In architectural terms, a folly is a building that is either constructed as decoration which suggests another purpose or is a practical garden building that transcends its purpose with extravagant features. An example of the former term would be buildings that were designed from the outset to look like ancient ruins, such as Wimpole’s Folly in Cambridgeshire, England; an example of the latter would be buildings like the Dunmore Pineapple in Stirlingshire, Scotland (I’ve been to this site a few times and was once able to go inside the pineapple). Designed to look like a giant pineapple, it was actually a working hothouse; that’s perhaps another story to tell. As for today’s topic, the folly of King Alfred would fall into the former definition.
Second of all, who was King Alfred, and why does he bear the sobriquet Great?
Statue of Alfred the Great at Wantage, Oxfordshire
Born in 849 AD, Alfred the Great was King of the West Saxons from 871 to 886, and then King of the Anglo-Saxons from 886 to 899. He lived in a time when Viking invasions and warring tribes were common. Both of his parents died when he was young, and his three older brothers reigned before he eventually came to the throne. The battles, invasions and wars are too numerous to mention; to be a king meant to be at war. At the age of 21, he was already the King of the Wessex and a battle veteran. In early 878, the Danes struck like lightening, taking Chippenham (on the map below, you’ll see that it was in the heart of Alfred’s territories); inhabitants surrendered or fled, and it reduced Alfred and his men to hit and run means of getting provisions; they withdrew into the tidal marshes of Somerset (the area on the other side of the River Severn, just below Wales on the map below). Alfred reevaluated his strategy and learned from his enemy: He and his men began a guerilla war against the Danes, and by May, he’d defeated them in the Battle of Edington. Knowing that he would never be able to drive out such a powerful enemy, he made a treaty with them, establishing borders and what became known as the Danelaw territory; King Guthrum of the Danes converted to Christianity, with Alfred as his godfather and soon son-in-law as he sealed the treaty by marrying one of Guthrum’s daughters, Aethelflaed.
The Great comes from the fact that he united many of the disparate tribes; he recognized the deterioration in learning caused by years of disrupting wars and the Viking’s destruction of the monasteries, which were centres of learning and literacy. He recognized the fact that without widespread literacy, a king cannot rule – a people who were not united by a written language would be more vulnerable; but united through a common tongue, they would have a sense of loyalty and continuity in turbulent times. They would be able to adhere to laws, reach legal decisions, and be called to arms more readily if they could read a common language. He set out to make the English proud of being English and thus be prepared to fight for it.
By stopping the Viking advance against all odds, and consolidating his territories, he set the stage for future kings. His accomplishments in Wessex became the seed that eventually gave fruition to a united Anglo-Saxon England, which is why he alone among all kings or queens of England bears the sobriquet Great.
King Alfred’s Folly:
King Alfred’s Folly – Credit, Flickr, Andrew Bone
King Alfred’s Tower was built between 1769 and 1772. To put those dates into perspective, here are a few events from the year that construction began: 13-year-old Mozart, under his father’s control, was just finishing his third concert tour of Italy; James Watt improved his design for a steam engine that would spark the Industrial Revolution; King Charles III of Spain sent missionaries to California, founding San Diego, Santa Barbara, San Francisco and Monterey; Daniel Boone set out to explore what would become Kentucky; and finally, in August of that year, Napoleon Bonapart was born in Corsica.
The tower itself was built near the site of Egbert’s Stone, which is said to mark the mustering site for the troops of the Battle of Edington; the tower was intended to commemorate the end of the Seven Years’ War and the ascension of King George III to the throne of England. It was designed in the Palladian style (a European architectural style) by the architect Henry Flitcroft, at the commission of Banker Henry Hoare. While the reasons for commissioning the tower might be altruistic of Hoare, its site and magnificence might have had something to do with the fact that the tower was an eye-catcher for those touring the parks at his private estate, Stourhead.
Standing at over 40 metres high (131 feet) and a circumference of 51 metres (167 feet), it is completely hollow; it is a triangular structure with a round “tower” at each corner, though only one of them has a use – a spiral staircase of 205 steps, with no landing places along the dizzying ascent or descent. The only safety is a rope “railing” anchored occasionally along the central pillar of the staircase; passing others up or down can be a tight squeeze, and it is not a climb for the faint-hearted. Once reaching the top, you’ll find a crenelated parapet that surrounds a viewing platform offering a great view of the surrounding region; the centre of the platform is surrounded by a guard rail as it is a gaping hole straight down to the ground level; it’s covered with a mesh netting to prevent birds from using the tower as a dovecote.
In 1944, the tower was damaged when a Canadian single-engine plane crashed into it in the fog, killing all five aboard. In the 1980s, it finally underwent repairs and restoration; the statue of King Alfred above the main entrance was also repaired at that time, restoring a missing right forearm. A stone tablet (also in need of restoration) between the door and statue reads:
ALFRED THE GREAT AD 879 on this Summit Erected his Standard Against Danish Invaders To him We owe The Origin of Juries The Establishment of a Militia The Creation of a Naval Force ALFRED The Light of a Benighted Age Was a Philosopher and a Christian The Father of his People The Founder of the English MONARCHY and LIBERTY
Maybe this is something you’ve never stopped to think about, but everything we use on a daily basis was, at some point, invented, discovered or developed by someone. Before shoes, people walked barefoot, or wrapped leather around their feet in colder climates; before plastic, well, the world was far better off. But no matter where they lived in the world, or what their climate was like, people found ways to entertain themselves, or to have fun social interaction with board games, or with simple stones, sticks and rocks.
Even prehistoric people developed games to pass the time: The Mesopotamians had the Royal Game of Ur; in Egypt and across the Middle East, they played a game referred to as Fifty-eight Holes. A game that goes back thousands of years, with many different simultaneous versions across the world, is Mancala / Sungka / Congkak, played with hollowed dips (which could be made in dirt, wood, or stone) which players fill sequentially with stones or shells or nuts (whatever was readily available in their region of the world). As reading and writing became more widespread, word games and written riddles became popular.
In 1913, the journalist Arthur Wynne, working for the New York World newspaper, submitted the world’s first Crossword Puzzle (image below), which appeared in the Sunday paper on 21 December. An immigrant from England, Wynne based his idea on the magic square (in recreational mathematics, this is a square arrangement of numbers in which the sum of numbers in each row, column and both main diagonals is the same). In this concept, a given set of words would need to be arranged so that they form a square; but in Wynne’s version, the words had to be discovered first. The first puzzle contained 31 terms, with the word “fun” already filled in as an example.
In the beginning, crosswords (originally called Word-Cross Puzzles) were in a diamond shape; within a few years, the crossword craze had taken off, and eventually, the shape morphed into a square grid with blank or black cells where voids occur.
Today, crosswords have more competition: word search puzzles, scrabble, anagrams, ciphers, and various forms of Sudoku are the strongest contenders for puzzlers’ free time.
What is your favourite word puzzle type? Please comment below!
For those outside of the US and/or Millennials, the term “Burma-Shave” might be new to you – which is why I’d like to “undust” this fascinating little piece of history.
The 1920s was a time of change; World War 1 was over, and the following Spanish flu had wiped out more people than the war itself; the survivors just wanted to celebrate life. Out went the starchy mentality of Victorian dresses and in came the flappers; innovations and scientific breakthroughs fed the hunger for the new and anything that made life easier.
At the time, men shaved themselves with shaving cream applied to the face with a brush and a straight razor blade (still common into the 1950s, when the double-edged safety razor began to gradually take over).
Enter, the Burma-shave brushless shaving cream: Introduced in 1925 by the Burma-Vita Company in Minneapolis, Minnesota, it was purported to have come from “the Malay Peninsula and Burma.” It was, in fact, a result of chemical experiments by chemist Carl Noren. The monicker was a marketing gimmick, much like products touting to be “Swiss” that are unknown here (even “Swiss cheese” – which one of the hundreds is meant?). The cream didn’t really take off, and while other similar products were coming out of larger companies such as Barbasol and Gilette, Burma-Shave managed to beat the odds when their clever advertising campaign was hit upon.
Around this time, the Ford Model T had become a huge success, with millions of new automobiles on ever-expanding road systems. Roadside signage was taking off, and the advertising gimmick was destined to go down in history as one of the quirkiest success stories.
Burma-Shave ads were a series of signs along the road that concluded in the sign saying “Burma-Shave”. The first couple of years, the signs were rather prosaic ads for the company; but as they began bringing in repeat customers, the signs became bolder and more experimental. They became more humorous rhymes – usually five signs, with a sixth ending the series as “Burma-Shave”.
Here are a few examples:
Shaving brushes / you’ll soon see ’em / on the shelf / in some / museum / Burma-Shave (1943)
Uncle Rube / buys tube / one week / looks sleek / like sheik / Burma-Shave (1930)
A shave / that’s real / no cuts to heal / a soothing / velvet after-feel / Burma-Shave (1932)
Shaving brush / and soapy smear / went out of / style with / hoops my dear / Burma-Shave (1936)
The Burma girls / in Mandalay / dunk bearded lovers / in the bay / who don’t use / Burma-Shave (1937)
As cars began to speed up, safety messages increased around 1939:
Hardly a driver / Is now alive / Who passed / On hills / At 75 / Burma-Shave (1939)
If you dislike / big traffic fines / slow down / ‘till you / can read these signs / Burma-Shave (1939)
At crossroads / don’t just / trust to luck / the other car / may be a truck / Burma-Shave (1939)
Don’t pass cars / on curve or hill / if the cops / don’t get you / morticians will / Burma-Shave (1940)
At intersections / look each way / a harp sounds nice / but it’s / hard to play / Burma-Shave (1941)
When World War 2 came around, the signs reflected the social conscience:
Maybe you can’t / shoulder a gun / but you can shoulder / the cost of one / buy defence bonds / Burma-Shave (1942)
Shaving brush / in army pack / was straw that broke / the rookie’s back / use brushless / Burma-Shave (1942)
Slap / the Jap / with / iron / scrap / Burma-Shave (1943)
Tho tough / and rough / from wind and wave / your cheek grows sleek / with / Burma-Shave (1943)
A few humorous signs:
She kissed / the hairbrush / by mistake / she thought it was / her husband Jake / Burma-Shave (1941)
We know / how much / you love that gal / but use both hands / for driving pal / Burma-Shave (1947)
I use it too / the bald man said / it keeps my chin / just like / my head / Burma-Shave (1947)
Road was slippery / curve was sharp / white robe, halo / wings and harp / Burma-Shave (1948)
If you think / she likes / your bristles / walk bare-footed / through some thistles / Burma-Shave (1948)
A man / a miss / a car – a curve / he kissed the miss / and missed the curve / Burma-Shave (1948)
Our fortune / is your / shaven face / it’s our best / advertising space / Burma-Shave (1963)
Toward the latter part of the signage, they began recycling earlier messages. Road signs and maintenance became increasingly expensive, and cars sped by faster than ever. The signs disappeared from the roads in 1963 when the company was sold to Phillip Morris and they discontinued the marketing campaign, which turned out to be a mistake; sold once again, the product eventually disappeared, but the term “Burma-Shave” can still be heard, referring to short, quirky rhymes.
I hate to end / this fun article / but time is short / so here’s what’s possible / Burma-Shave examples from Pinterest:
This illustration is from “A History of the Burma-Vita Company”, written by Frank Rowsome Jr. and illustrated by Carl Rose (published by the Stephen Greene Press in 1963).
The topic of this article has been on my mind for the past two weeks; last week flew by so fast I barely had time to blink, let alone order my thoughts into coherent sentences. The topic was sparked by coming across an article online about what is known as the “Milan Conference” or “The Second International Congress on Education of the Deaf” (though it was, in fact, the first), held in Milan, Italy in 1880.
To give you a bit of my personal background, I learned BSL (The Glaswegian dialect) and translated for the deaf when I lived in Scotland. Being as close to that community as I was, I’d shockingly never heard about the Milan Conference until a fortnight ago.
When I first moved to Switzerland, I wanted to continue working with the deaf and began taking Swiss German sign classes. I immediately began hitting brick walls: The crux of the matter was spelled out – they didn’t want hearing people in their world. It made little sense to me back then, and it was frustrating. Also at that time, my husband wasn’t yet hearing impaired – which would have made a difference in their attitude toward me, as people with family members affected by hearing loss were more acceptable to them. In light of the Milan Conference, their reticence makes perfect sense. I never was able to break that barrier, and I’ve lost much of the sign language I once used fluently.
The conference was an international gathering of (hearing – with only ONE exception) educators of the deaf and mute. The imperialist arrogance of the discriminating resolutions passed profoundly wounded and damaged the deaf community for nearly 100 years.
To sum up the conference’s resolutions briefly, the majority decided that sign language was disadvantageous to integrating the deaf into the hearing world, and they banned – yes, banned – sign language from the education of the deaf in favour of “oralism” – forcing the deaf to read lips to make them assimilate to the hearing world’s culture. Deaf teachers lost their jobs, and an overall decline of deaf professionals resulted – they were no longer allowed the tools to communicate in their own language, and communication professions such as artists, lawyers and writers fell silent. Here in Switzerland, there was a two-fold impact: Deaf children were forced to sit on their hands and learn to lip-read from High German-speaking teachers; but when they went home on holidays, they couldn’t lip-read their own family’s dialects of Swiss German, and so they were isolated from society both in school and at home. The anger and resentment to the hearing world still runs deep.
Most disturbing for me is the fact that Alexander Graham Bell, whose own mother and wife were deaf and who worked with the deaf throughout his life – including helping bring Helen Keller out of her silent world as a blind and deaf girl – was one of the strongest proponents for oralism at the conference. The most famous picture of Bell and Keller is one in which Keller is finger-spelling on Bell’s hand. It is a form of sign language. Yet he advocated to eradicate it.
The resolutions of 1880 held their ground until they were overturned in 2013 when an official apology was issued to the deaf community. Eleven years ago. Let that sink in. Inroads were made to teach sign in pockets here and there; in America, most schools for the deaf only began teaching sign language again in the 1960s; in the UK it was around a decade later. Generations suffered under the restriction. [For those who have been deaf their whole lives – what’s known as pre-lingually deaf – it means that sign language is their first language, while spoken English is their second; this can lead to difficulties in understanding complex or abstract messages in English. Imagine being denied your own native language…] Only in 2003, the British government recognised BSL as a minority language – but so far, Scotland is the only country in the UK that has given BSL legal recognition. The shift in understanding and recognition had already been set in motion by the time I’d moved to the UK, which is perhaps why the Milan Conference was no longer a topic when I was involved in the deaf community.
The ban is the main reason there are so many regional dialects today: Even though sign language was officially banned, the deaf still needed to communicate among themselves, and so signs evolved “under the table” within each pocket of deaf students. There was no exchange of information; for example, “bread” took on the shape of the local speciality, so in the French part it looks like a long baguette, while in the Zurich region, it looks more like a half-sphere. There are 5 major Swiss-German dialects; in Scotland, there were at least 7.
Please click here to watch a ~13-minute video by Storied about the history of sign language and the Milan Conference. If you’d like to learn more about the timeline of sign language in Britain, please click here to visit University College London’s website, and to learn more about BSL in Scotland, click hereto read the Scottish Parliament’s article.
ASL, American Sign Language, also has a forgotten predecessor that was largely written out of history: The Plains Indian Sign Language, also known as “hand talk”. For an interesting video about that history, click here.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief insight into a long and tangled topic, and that it encourages you to look into it more.
Just as a parting trivia: Everyone recognizes the sign for phone; but did you know that it became a euphemism in some deaf communities for the restroom/loo? Back when restaurants had their public phones near the “small closets”, the Deaf would sign “phone” as a polite, covert way of saying they were going to the restroom/loo.
Below are the British Sign Language and the American Sign Language alphabets; I’d encourage you to learn one or the other and stretch those grey cells a wee bit!
Stephanie Huesler 