The Study of Natural Sign Language in Eighteenth-Century France

Abstract

In 1779 the French Deaf author Pierre Desloges published a book on sign language and deaf education. This publication, together with additional contemporary sources, provides insights into an early phase of sign language use in eighteenth-century Paris as well as into the history of ideas on signs.

From Gesture to Sign: Sign Language Dictionaries and the Invention of a Language

“…His priority, instead, was to convey the importance of teaching with signs so that deaf pupils could fully understand the meaning of written words. In fact, de l'Epée's dictionary did not provide descriptions for most signs but, rather, explications of terms much like any dictionary would (Fischer 1999(Fischer , 2014Rée 1999). Very few of the entries include the description of the corresponding signs (Sicard 1808, xxxxix, 3).…”

“…While Brouland might have been the first to publish a dictionary, Pélissier wrote, he had been the first to undertake the task of creating one, a number of years earlier. Pélissier even mentioned that he and Brouland had both studied Jarisch's German dictionary, which was owned by the library of their institution (Fischer 2014). Pélissier's dictionary was fully reproduced by Flausino José da Costa Gama, who had sojourned in Paris as a student before returning to Brazil to teach sign language (Sofiato and Reily 2012).…”

“…In Sicard's introduction to his Théorie des signes pour l'instruction des sourdsmuets (Theory of Signs for the Instruction of Deaf-Mute People), he claims that the dictionary's role is to establish the conventional status of signs; he gives sign language legitimacy by opposing his signs to natural signs (Sicard 1808b). "Natural sign" was the term given to signs that could be easily deciphered by their immediate context; they were often compared to signs used by earlier ages of humanity and to the language of so-called "savages" in the "New World" (Fischer 1993(Fischer , 2002. The signs Sicard promoted implied, instead, a system of communication based on conventions that emulated written French.…”

“…The series of dictionaries that followed did not function as regular updates of Sicard's first publication; instead, they offered a selection of signs without acknowledging their evolution from the signs recorded in previous works (Bonnal 2003(Bonnal , 2004Bonnal-Vergés 2012;Fischer 1991Fischer , 1996. An 1890 speech by Père Bouchet addressed to the bishop Bécel in Vannes used the image of Babel to retrospectively characterize sign language.…”