Saturday

April Flowers

In April, an interview of me will appear in Works & Conversations, with the announcement that " In Search of the Languageless Tribe" will be published soon. Hurrah!

I just came back from Southern England after interviewing a friend and fellow actor in the National Theater of the Deaf of Dot Miles whom I write about in the new book.

I'm off to Paris and then rural France this week. Back to England, then off the Austria at the end of March. I will be speaking in Salzburg at The English Center.

Then back to Shropshire to continue rewriting the book, adding, subtracting and polishing it for publication.

Thank you, all who have been supporting me and the advocacy for Deaf language rigtht, for these many years.

L'chaim, and equal access to language and life,
susan

www.susanschaller.com

Tuesday

The Honesty, Creativity and Confidence of 5-yr.-olds

Dear Readers,

Let's all be 5 again. Just think of everything we could accomplish!


In Chapter Two: Language Wars

... My attraction to languages and their respective cultures stems from both the early love of my father and also from his strange sub-culture. When I was five, I remember the excitement of learning to read. I knew it was a doorway into a much bigger world outside our little house in Wyoming. Only days or weeks after learning to read, I wandered into my father’s office where books stood, wall to wall, floor to ceiling, and lay scattered across his messy desk. I climbed onto his big oak swivel chair to reach the top of his desk. My father always had open books, at least three, in his work space, besides all the papers and closed books circling the writing pad. I pulled the first book closer. Shock, disappointment and excitement all flooded my insides at once, as I stared at a completely different and unreadable alphabet. That ancient Greek book was next to an ancient Hebrew text and next to an English book with the familiar alphabet but few words I could understand. I found more funny words or lettering in Latin and old German Script books, all lying in front of me. For a split second, I felt like I was drowning in an ocean, but with the confidence of a five-year-old, I decided to learn how to read them all.