Sign language has always intrigued many scientists and scholars.
During Antiquity, philosophers observed the signs practiced by deaf people expressing themselves through pantomimes or family codes.
Aristotle brings the deaf population closer to a world considered inferior: that of animals.
He speaks of the deaf in his book entitled
History of Animals
:
“People who are deaf from birth are also all mute.
They make sounds but have no language.”
Plato, whose disciple he was, is more nuanced, he gives the value of the signs used by the deaf of his time:
“If we had neither voice nor language and we wanted to show things to each other , wouldn't we try as the mute do to indicate them with the hands, the head and the body.
(
The Cratylus
, 34).
However, deaf people, because they were deprived of speech and used “simple gestures”, were considered as beings…
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