The Fragility of Sense: Language, Ethics, and Understanding in Deaf Nepal (WGF - Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship)

Summary

This resource is an application for the Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Wenner-Gren Foundation.

My book, The Fragility of Sense: Language, Ethics, and Understanding in Deaf Nepal, draws on 23 months of fieldwork to explore what it means to live in a world where language cannot be taken for granted. In Nepal, roughly 5000 deaf persons - those involved in deaf schools and organizations - learn Nepali Sign Language (NSL). Most deaf persons, however, use "natural sign," an NSL term that refers to communication using a fairly small repertoire of conventional signs complemented by iconic and indexical strategies. These particular characteristics make understanding natural sign both feasible and tenuous. Through ethnography and video analysis of interactions, this book reveals that making sense to and of others depends not only on the skillful use of available semiotic resources, but also on securing potential addressees' attention and willingness. In other words, natural sign conversations become intelligible only when the people involved take the ethical position that such intelligibility is possible in the first place.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• WGF - Support for Writing Projects   •
• Wenner-Gren Foundation

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Contact(s): Wenner-Gren Foundation

Notes

Rights & Attribution: This resource is an application from the Wenner-Gren Foundation and has been approved by the grantee solely for pedagogical purposes. Please do not cite, circulate, or duplicate any part of these documents without the express written consent of the author.

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