Today, September 23rd, marks the International Day of Sign Languages, a day of celebration for signing individuals all over the world, as well as the end of Deaf Awareness Week, cherishing all forms of Deaf culture and community. Throughout recent years, governments all over the planet have passed legislation recognizing that sign language, be it from France, Germany, or Paraguay, is a language with a complex linguistic structure that hails from a very rich culture, and a benefit to growing deaf and hard of hearing minds everywhere.
It is no surprise that Visual Vernacular, an ASL storytelling technique that is a culmination of elements including strong body language, facial expressions, and mime, has become a global phenomenon that has spread like wildfire. Internationally, artists are sharing their knack for making scenes from their imagination come to life using only their hands, face, and bodies. Where did this all begin?
In the 1960s, Bernard Bragg, a Deaf American performing artist coined the name of the art form Visual Vernacular (VV) and spearheaded its popularity. This technique is primarily performed by Deaf performance artists in many different facets of entertainment ranging from poetry, storytelling, and theatre. VV’s immense popularity amongst Deaf culture created the rise of many VV artists such as VV Underground and stand out stars like Justin Perez, Ian Sanborn, and Lisa McBee. The art craft has seen many talented performers, each with their own style, take, and addition to the skill.
Seek the World's 'VV: A Deaf German Lady's Tsunami Story'
Bragg was raised in a Deaf family, his mother and father were involved in amateur theatre, and he was later mentored under the tutelage of the mime artist, Marcel Merceau, when he studied abroad in France. Years before his mentorship, when Bragg first saw Marceau perform at a San Francisco show he said, “After I saw Marceau’s performance, I said to myself, if he can do a two-hour show without saying a word, why can’t I?”
After that one show Bragg stuck around after the performance to show off to Marceau his natural talent in silent performance, this sparked an interest in the mime and he instantly invited Bragg to study under him in Paris nudging him closer to a life in theatre. So it was really no wonder he was able to combine everything he knew into something so special as Visual Vernacular. He also was one of the founders of National Theatre of the Deaf, which grew to its fame in Connecticut and created the roots for Connecticut Deaf Theatre to flourish. VV was a huge part of Deaf theatre history in Connecticut, which is why today’s celebration hits home for us.
Bernard Bragg's 'The Pilot & The Eagle'
Visual Vernacular is cinematic in every single way. Visually it can be compared to watching a short film. A VV performance cannot begin without setting scenes being set in the very beginning. Once the audience knows where and what the performer is trying to tell their audience, the rest falls in place. The performer describes settings, objects, movements, and characters in split seconds. Objects are also described through ASL hand classifiers when either talking about their placement or showing how they’ve moved in a scene. This allows performers to take the audience in every direction possible. Their imagination is the limit!
Because of the cinematic quality of VV, topics often covered are movie or animation scenes; nature such as animals and plant life; fast paced travel; or fight scenes. If the performer is a fan of cinema they can reenact their favorite moments throughout the movie in their own style. If they love the process of life when it comes to wildlife they can become fully immersed in their own expressive manner. If someone lives for action and they can’t get enough adrenaline, they can immerse themselves in that world and shape it into something even better. But the topics just don't stop there, again, VV only stops with your imagination.
The Daily Moth's 'VV: Guess Which Movie It is'
ASL poetry is another form of a vehicle for VV. We have seen Deaf artists, like Douglas Ridloff, make their written word a visual phenomenon for their audience. Each sign that they perform often has a domino-like effect where they naturally fall into one another in a seamless effort until the final word is said. They do this while simultaneously making sure their facial expressions and body language are in sync to tell their poetic stories.
Douglas Ridloff's 'Visual Poetry'
Expression is an art that many people still have yet to truly grasp. But in the Deaf world, visual expression is everything. From how we speak to one another through sign or how we show that we’re enjoying something, the Deaf community has always had Visual Vernaculars intertwined with their lifestyle, but it took someone like Bernard Bragg key in on that aspect of Deaf culture and create something that celebrated the beauty of our language and culture.
Source:
Swinbourne, C. (2018, November 8). Worldwide Deaf community mourns Bernard Bragg, the ‘father of Visual Vernacular’ [web log]. Retrieved September 14, 2022, from https://limpingchicken.com/2018/11/08/worldwide-deaf-community-mourns-bernard-bragg-the-father-of-visual-vernacular/#:~:text=Over%20the%20last%20week%2C%20the,at%20the%20age%20of%2090.
Genzlinger, N. (2018, November 1). Bernard Bragg, who showed the way for deaf actors, dies at 90. The New York Times. Retrieved September 14, 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/01/obituaries/bernard-bragg-dead.html
International Week of Deaf People 2022. WFD. (2022, September 15). Retrieved September 16, 2022, from https://wfdeaf.org/iwdeaf2022/
Visionary leader - October 2014, Bernard Bragg. Gallaudet University. (2022, June 1). Retrieved September 20, 2022, from https://gallaudet.edu/museum/celebrating-150-years/visionary-leader-october-2014-bernard-bragg/
Flofitzgerald. (2019, April 29). Visual vernacular - creative access in splash! Extraordinary Bodies. Retrieved September 20, 2022, from https://www.extraordinarybodies.org.uk/visual-vernacular/
Brandwijk, M. van. (2017). Visual Vernacular An Inter and Intra Sign Language Poetry Genre Comparison (thesis). Retrieved September 20, 2022, from https://studenttheses.universiteitleiden.nl/access/item%3A2629234/view
