Susan Schaller to speak about ‘Languagelessness’

Ildefonso, a 27-year old deaf man, had lived his entire life without words or any real way of communicating until Susan Schaller did something considered impossible to the academic community; she taught an adult his first language.\nSchaller, author and human rights advocate, will come to Speech and Hearing Building, room C141 at 3 p.m. Friday to give a speech titled, “Languagelessness, the Critical Period and Adult Language Acquisition: Ildefonso’s Story.” She will also discuss her books, “A Man without Words” and “Lives without Words, People without Language.” She will talk about her experiences with Ildefonso and the other people she has met in the same situation.\n“When you look at it as a human rights violation, it should never, ever happen,” Schaller said.\nThough Schaller has only met about 100 people without language, she said more than 100,000 people in the world have never learned a language to help them communicate sufficiently.\n“Out of billions of people in the world, it seems like a very small percentage, but it’s sad because it constitutes a level of neglect,” said Chris Ruggles, an IU student. \nJunior Scott Valenkamph, who is currently taking a second-level sign language course, said the numbers don’t surprise him. \n“I probably wouldn’t think the number would be that high, but I’m not surprised,” he said. “I know there are a lot of poor, underprivileged people in the world.”\nBut Schaller said a person does not have to be born into an underprivileged family to become languageless.\n“I was absolutely astounded (Ildefonso) existed, but I realized it is so easy for this to happen,” Schaller said. “It doesn’t have to be poverty or a Third World country.”\nSchaller said a baby can easily be raised without a language because most deaf babies are born into hearing families who have never been exposed to sign language.\n“We don’t naturally speak two languages, so it’s not automatic for us to think of language for a baby,” Schaller said. “But language is a huge part of a baby’s life.”\nSchaller said she has repeatedly brought up the question of what it means to be human since she met Ildefonso and many others like him living without language.\n“Language crosses many fields because it brings up the question of what it means to be human,” Schaller said. “The definition of human is to have a strong sense of morality, which is often expressed through language.”\nSchaller said most of these people have strong senses of morality, yet they couldn’t speak. Once completely immersed into the deaf culture, Schaller said many of these people pick up language quickly, contradicting the academic theory that humans cannot learn a language when they reach adulthood.\nRuggles took a psychology class and said he learned a lot about the areas of the brain associated with language. “But we didn’t talk at all about people without any exposure to language,” Ruggles said. “Because American Sign Language is used in the same area of the brain, I’m surprised those people could pick up a language so quick.”\nSchaller continues to help those who do not know a language and will discuss the topic in depth Friday.\n“It makes you look at what happens when you look at a subject through one pair of glasses – an educational pair – versus looking at the same thing through a human–rights lens.” Schaller said. “It gives you a whole different set of perspectives.”