Summary of critical article

Perceptions of Deaf Characters in Adolescent Literature

Sharon Pajka-West- Written for the ALAN Review Summer 2007, vol 34,3 page 39.

This article reviews several books that have teen deaf characters in them, some are main characters and others are only minor but are interesting enough to be mentioned. The study that Pajka-West proposed was to examine six novels, three from deaf authors and three from hearing authors. The six books that were selected were Apple is my Sign by M. Riskind(hearing); Of Sound Mind by J. Ferris (hearing)(two characters); Finding Abby by V. Scott (deaf); A Maiden’s Grave by J. Deaver (hearing) (two characters), Deaf Child Crossing by M. Matlin (deaf); and Nick’s Secret by C. Blatchford (deaf). The study had adults read two of the six books to gage their response about the deaf characters in the books. The adults were put into three categories, adults who where deaf, adults who had friends or associated with deaf and adults that had never had exposure to the deaf world. Pajka-West then goes through the list of deaf characters in the different novels and breaks down each adult category and what they thought about the characters. Pajka-West originated this idea for a study on this topic when a former student asked her for a reading list with characters like her (the student was deaf). Pajka-West then thought about a possible reading list and asked the question-because more deaf characters are appearing in books are they really quality characters? So Pajka-West started the study and then printed her findings in ALAN magazine.