Tanya Zaricor
05/10/2007
Laurent Clerc
Laurent Clerc was born in La Balme France in 1786. When he
was thirty he was a teacher at the royal institution for the
Deaf, in Paris where he was a Deaf scholar and graduate.
Laurent Clerc met Gallaudet in England in 1815 and decided
to go with him to the United States to teach Deaf students.
Together they opened the Asylum at Harteford in April of
1817 (Crouch &Van Cleve, 1989, p. 37).
Laurent was the first Deaf teacher teaching Deaf students
in the United States. Further more he was the first
advocator for sign language instruction instead of oral
instruction for the education of Deaf students. He also
worked for the rights of people and the right for Deaf
people to marry as well as stressing the importance of Deaf
education and Culture (Famous Americans, 2007,
paragraph 1).
Laurent Clerc thought that Sign Language was equal to other
spoken languages and that Deafness was a minority Culture.
Laurent Clerc is known for being the first teacher of the
Deaf in the United States and one of the founders of the
school that would later be the only Deaf University in the
United States, Gallaudet University (Famous Americans,
2007, paragraph 2).
References
American Foundation for the Blind.
(2007) “Helen Keller Biography”, [Online]. Available:
http://www.afb.org/braillebug/helen_keller_bio.asp (May 3,
2007).
Crouch, Barry A. & SEQ CHAPTER \h \r
1Van Cleve, John V. (1989). A Place of Their Own:
Creating the Deaf Community in America. Washington, D.C.
Gallaudet University Press.
Foster, Ray. (2001). “Laurent Clerc”,
[Online]. Available: http://www.famousamericans.net (May, 3
2007).
HKSB: Biography of Helen Keller,
[Online]. Available: http://www.helenkeller.org (April 19,
2007).
IMDB. (1990-2007). “Biography of
Marlee Matlin”. [Online]. Available: http://www.imdb.com
(May 31, 2007).
Marlee Matlin “Biography &
Filmography”, [Online]. Available: www.marleeonline.com/lifebio/printbio.html
(May 10, 2007).