Harlan Lane (born August 19, 1936)

[reviews_and_ramblings]

Harlan Lane is Distinguished University professor of psychology at Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts, in the United States, and founder of the Center for Research in Hearing, Speech, and Language. His research is focused on speech, Deaf culture, and sign language. Lane was born in Brooklyn on August 19, 1936. Remaining in New York City for college, he obtained both a B.S. and an M.S. in Psychology from Columbia University in 1958. He subsequently received a Ph.D. in Psychology from Harvard and a second Ph.D. in Linguistics from the Sorbonne. In 1991, Lane received a MacArthur Foundation "genius award".

Lane - a hearing man - has become an often controversial spokesman for the Deaf community and critic of cochlear implants. He has written extensively on the social construction of disability and states that "Unless Deaf people challenge the culturally determined meanings of deaf and disability with at least as much vigor as the technologies of normalization seek to institutionalize those meanings, the day will continue to recede in which Deaf children and adults live the fullest lives and make the fullest contribution to our diverse society." In recognition of his research and advocacy regarding these issues, Lane has received the Distinguished Service Award from the National Association of the Deaf (United States), the International Social Merit Award from the World Federation of the Deaf, and numerous other awards.

He is Commandeur de l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques, the highest level of the academic honor given out by the French government.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlan_Lane


Bertha Harris, Franklin Philip and Harlan Lane, 1993, by Robert Giard (http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/dl_crosscollex/brbldl_getrec.asp?fld=img&id=1121714)

American photographer Robert Giard is renowned for his portraits of American poets and writers; his particular focus was on gay and lesbian writers. Some of his photographs of the American gay and lesbian literary community appear in his groundbreaking book Particular Voices: Portraits of Gay and Lesbian Writers, published by MIT Press in 1997. Giard’s stated mission was to define the literary history and cultural identity of gays and lesbians for the mainstream of American society, which perceived them as disparate, marginal individuals possessing neither. In all, he photographed more than 600 writers. (http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/digitallibrary/giard.html)

Further Readings:

The Mask of Benevolence: Disabling the Deaf Community by Harlan Lane
Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: DawnSignPress (March 1, 1999)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1581210094
ISBN-13: 978-1581210095
Amazon: The Mask of Benevolence: Disabling the Deaf Community

A look at the gulf that separates the deaf minority from the hearing world, this book sheds light on the mistreatment of the deaf community by a hearing establishment that resists understanding and awareness. Critically acclaimed as a breakthrough when it was first published in 1992, this new edition includes information on the science and ethics of childhood cochlear implants. An indictment of the ways in which experts in the scientific, medical, and educational establishment purport to serve the deaf, this book describes how they, in fact, do them great harm.

More Particular Voices at my website: http://www.elisarolle.com/, My Ramblings/Particular Voices