Gallaudet University is a private federally chartered university in Washington, D.C., for the education of the deaf and hard of hearing. It was founded in 1864 as a grammar school for both deaf and blind children. It was the first school for the advanced education of the deaf and hard of hearing in the world and remains the only higher education institution in which all programs and services are specifically designed to accommodate deaf and hard of hearing students. Hearing students are admitted to the graduate school and a small number are also admitted as undergraduates each year. The university was named after Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, a notable figure in the advancement of deaf education.
Ina Donna Coolbrith was an American poet, writer, librarian, and a prominent figure in the San Francisco Bay Area literary community. Called the "Sweet Singer of California", she was the first California Poet Laureate and the first poet laureate of any American state.
Dorothy "Dot" Miles was a Welsh poet and activist in the Deaf community. Throughout her life, she composed her poems in English, British Sign Language, and American Sign Language. Her work laid the foundations for modern sign language poetry in the United States and the United Kingdom. She is regarded as the pioneer of BSL poetry and her work influenced many contemporary deaf poets.
Caroline Wigley Clive was an English writer known by the pseudonym V. She was known chiefly as the author of IX Poems that when first published, took their place in the forefront of then-contemporary feminine verse. Clive wrote all her life, was a brilliant conversationalist, was held in the highest regard within an exceptionally notable intellectual circle, and carried on a large correspondence.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Claude Catherine de Clermont-Tonnerre de Vivonne, lady of Dampierre, countess and duchess of Retz, was a French courtier, writer, and salon host.
Eliza Lanesford Cushing was an American-Canadian dramatist, short story writer, and editor. The daughter of Hannah Webster Foster and sister of Harriet Vaughan Cheney, both novelists, she wrote a number of plays including Esther and The Fatal Ring, and edited Literary Garland, Canada's main literary magazine at the time.
The history of deaf education in the United States began in the early 1800s when the Cobbs School of Virginia, an oral school, was established by William Bolling and John Braidwood, and the Connecticut Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb, a manual school, was established by Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet and Laurent Clerc. When the Cobbs School closed in 1816, the manual method, which used American Sign Language, became commonplace in deaf schools for most of the remainder of the century. In the late 1800s, schools began to use the oral method, which only allowed the use of speech, as opposed to the manual method previously in place. Students caught using sign language in oral programs were often punished. The oral method was used for many years until sign language instruction gradually began to come back into deaf education.
Charlotte "Lotten" Louise von Kræmer was a Swedish baroness, writer, poet, philanthropist and women's rights activist. She was the founder of the literary society Samfundet De Nio and, alongside Martina Bergman-Österberg, the main financier of the National Association for Women's Suffrage.
Jane Laurie Borthwick was hymn writer, translator of German hymns and a noble supporter of home and foreign missions. She worked closely with her sister, Sarah Laurie Findlater. She published under the pseudonym: H. L. L.. Jane Laurie Borthwick is best known for the Hymns from the Land of Luther; her most famous translation today is Be still, my soul and her most known original text is Come, labor on. Like Catherine Winkworth and Frances Elizabeth Cox, she greatly contributed to English-language hymnody by mediating German hymnody.
Clara H. Mountcastle was a Canadian artist and author who published her early work under the pseudonym Caris Sima.
Regina Olson Hughes (1895–1993) was an American scientific illustrator in Botanical Art. Born February 1, 1895, in Herman, Nebraska, she became fascinated with the world of plants and flowers. Her parents were Gilbert and Johanna (Sullivan) Olson. At age 10, she contracted scarlet fever and her hearing slowly diminished until she became fully deaf at age 14. In order for her to communicate with her peers, she relied on lip reading and written notes for business work. Hughes retained her speech skills and continued to speak fluently throughout her adulthood. She became proficient in American Sign Language when she enrolled in Gallaudet University.
Edith Mansford Fitzgerald (1877–1940) was a deaf American woman who invented a system for the deaf to learn proper placement of words in the construction of sentences. Her method, which was known as the 'Fitzgerald Key,' was used to teach those with hearing disabilities in three-quarters of the schools in the United States.
Emily Thornton Charles was a 19th-century American poet, journalist, editor, and newspaper founder. Married in 1861 and widowed in 1869, she was left with two children to support. In 1874, she began a successful career as a journalist, at first as correspondent and reporter for various newspapers, and later as editor. She was associate editor of the book entitled Eminent men of Indiana. In 1881, she became managing editor of the Washington World and was the founder, manager and editor of the National Veteran at Washington, D.C. She was actively identified with the National woman suffrage convention, the Woman's National Press Association, and the Society of American Authors. Her published writings, under the pseudonym "Emily Hawthorne," include Hawthorne Blossoms (1876); and Lyrical Poems, Songs, Pastorals, War Poems, and Madrigals (1886). Charles favored woman's suffrage. She died in 1895.
Harriet Melissa Bunker Austin was an American author.
Clementina Laura Majocchi, also known by her pseudonym Bruna, was an Italian poet and writer.
Nellie Jane Norman was a deaf performer, director, professor, and curator, recognized for her work on the faculty of Gallaudet University. She actively promoted deaf culture, language, and art through her contributions to teaching, TV programs, and film festivals. In 2007, she founded the National Deaf Life Museum at Gallaudet.
John Carlin was an American illustrator, painter and poet. He was the first published deaf poet in the USA.
Pauline Leader was a writer and poet, noted for her memoir, And No Birds Sing, which chronicles her growing up in Bennington, Vermont as an outcast daughter of Jewish immigrants and her bohemian life in Greenwich Village, subsequent to becoming deaf at age 12. Her work pioneered understanding the perspective of people with disabilities and represented a step towards recognizing the need to accommodate them in society.
American 
