Talking about her like she wasn’t there
Charlie noticed from a very young age that her mother wasn’t accepting her as a deaf person, that she tried to do everything in her power to make her “acceptable”. Even at an instance where she seemingly understands her after her father comments on how scary the cochlear implants sound, Charlie ironically feels unseen and unaccepted.
“She was right, to a point. What scared Charlie more was her mother talking about her like she wasn’t there at all.”
Refusing to let the children learn the sign language
The main ironic concept presented in the novel is the prevention of deaf children to learn the sign language in an effort to make sure they learn English and adapt better to the normal education system. What this leads to is cognitive, linguistic and emotional halt in the development of these children. As the headmistress February often witnessed, the children become frustrated because of the isolation and the inability to communicate in a way that is proper for them.
Eliot’s story
Probably the most disturbing and tragic part of the novel is the story of Austin’s roommate Eliot that shows the cruel and ironic twist of something that was supposed to bring comfort. After his father’s death in a tragic accident, his mother finds comfort and peace in religion and regular visits to the church, where she brings Eliot along. Unbeknownst to him, the church’s pastor and his mother plan a cruel religious ritual and him as the main target. They try to “heal” him of his deafness, which almost leads to his death and leaves him permanently scarred.
Kayla, BASL and racism
The novel makes a commentary on racism that doesn’t skip over the deaf community. Kayla, Charlie’s black girl, falls victim to an ignorant racist remark by Austin, who make fun of her sign for chicken. Since black ASL developed differently through history, some signs are naturally different. Despite the offensive remark stemming from ignorance, Kayla still comments on the racism involving the ASL community and irony behind it:
“She had plans for a follow-up series – the history of BASL, or something about how in some cases segregation wound up giving Black kids better language access, because when oralism took over white Deaf schools, Deaf teachers were sent to Black Deaf schools, since no one cared whether Black kids learned to talk.”
