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Tenth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind
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Historical SummaryThe origin of language is doubtless to be traced to a mixture of sounds and gestures and the physiological basis is perhaps seen to best advantage in the case of Laura Bridgman, the deaf and blind girl who preceded Helen Keller in point of time. She used "noises" as names for her companions and attendants in Perkins Institution, although she could not herself hear these noises. Dr. Howe says:
Laura uses . . . [sounds] for different persons of her acquaintance whom she meets, having a distinct sound for each one. When, after a short absence, she goes into the sitting room, where there are a dozen blind girls, she embraces them by turns, uttering rapidly, and in a high key, the peculiar sound which designates each one; and so different are they, that any of the blind girls can tell whom she is with. Now, if she were talking about these very girls to a third person, she would make the sign for them on her fingers without hesitation; yet I am inclined to believe that the thought of their vocal sign occurs first, and is translated, as it were, into the finger language, because when she is alone she sometimes utters these sounds or names of persons. She said to me, in answer to a question, why she uttered a certain sound rather than spelled the name, "I think of Jennette’s noise, many times, when I think how she give me good things; I do not think to spell her name." At another time, hearing her, in the next room, make the peculiar sound for Jennette, I hastened to her, and asked her why she made it; she said, "Because I think how she do love me much, and I love her very much."1
1 , 20 (1842).
Chicago: Tenth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind in Primitive Behavior: An Introduction to the Social Sciences, ed. Thomas, William I. (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1937), Original Sources, accessed May 16, 2024, http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=1ISNC6ZJLY1S89K.
MLA: . Tenth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind, in Primitive Behavior: An Introduction to the Social Sciences, edited by Thomas, William I., New York, McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1937, Original Sources. 16 May. 2024. http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=1ISNC6ZJLY1S89K.
Harvard: , Tenth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Perkins Institution and Massachusetts Asylum for the Blind. cited in 1937, Primitive Behavior: An Introduction to the Social Sciences, ed. , McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., New York. Original Sources, retrieved 16 May 2024, from http://www.originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=1ISNC6ZJLY1S89K.
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