Carol A. Padden (born 1955 in Washington, D.C.) is an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

academic, author, and lecturer. She is a

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professo ...

in the Department of Communication at the

University of California, San Diego The University of California, San Diego (UC San Diego or colloquially, UCSD) is a public land-grant research university in San Diego, California. Established in 1960 near the pre-existing Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego is ...

, where she has been teaching since 1983. Padden received Bachelor's of Science in linguistics at Georgetown University. She was named a 2010

MacArthur Fellow The MacArthur Fellows Program, also known as the MacArthur Fellowship and commonly but unofficially known as the "Genius Grant", is a prize awarded annually by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation typically to between 20 and 30 indi ...

and a 1992

Guggenheim Fellow Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

Background

She was born deaf to a Deaf family, and also has a Deaf older brother.Padden, Carol and Humphries, Tom. Deaf in America: Voices from A Culture, page 1 Both of her parents were faculty members at

Gallaudet University Gallaudet University ( ) is a private university, private University charter#Federal, federally chartered research university in Washington, D.C. for the education of the Hearing loss, deaf and hard of hearing. It was founded in 1864 as a gramma ...

My parents are both deaf, and I have an older deaf brother, so sign language was a natural part of my upbringing. When I was eight, I transferred from a special school for deaf children to my local public school and for the first time, I was among children and adults who did not sign. I often describe this experience as being "educated abroad," because it gave me a sense of self and difference that I did not have before.

She was reared bilingually in English and

American Sign Language American Sign Language (ASL) is a natural language that serves as the predominant sign language of Deaf communities in the United States of America and most of Anglophone Canada. ASL is a complete and organized visual language that is expre ...

. As a child, she was immersed in Deaf culture: the people with whom she and her family socialized attended both Deaf schools and Deaf clubs. Padden is married to

Tom Humphries Tom Humphries is a former sports journalist and columnist who wrote for ''The Irish Times'' while volunteering at a North Dublin Gaelic games club. His career as a leading sportswriter was ended after his history of child sexual abuse emerged i ...

, who is also

Deaf Deafness has varying definitions in cultural and medical contexts. In medical contexts, the meaning of deafness is hearing loss that precludes a person from understanding spoken language, an audiological condition. In this context it is written ...

and has co-authored several books with her. She also has one child of her own who is not deaf.

Views on Deaf Culture

''Deaf in America: Voices from A Culture'' was a pioneer in Deaf Studies. This book's goal was to "write about people in a new and different way." Padden and Humphries did not want to focus on writing about their hearing loss, but to focus on their language and their culture. Much has been written since this book, and Deaf Studies has really flourished. In 1988, however, this was a relatively new concept. Carol Padden has experienced Deaf Culture first-hand since birth. However, in the Deaf Community, this is not always the case. Many Deaf people from hearing families do not have exposure to Deaf culture until they become adults. In fact, Carol Padden's spouse Tom Humphries became deaf at the age of six, but did not meet other Deaf people until he entered college. Together, they have participated in a new generation of research on sign language.

MacArthur Fellowship

In 2010, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation named Carol Padden a recipient of its so-called "genius" grant. The foundation recognized Padden's pioneering work in the morphology and evolution of American Sign Language with a no-strings attached grant of $500,000.

Research

Padden's PhD dissertation on

morphology and syntax was published in the Garland Press Outstanding Dissertations (Linguistics Series, 1988).

Selected works

Padden's published writings encompass 43 works in 78 publications in 7 languages and 5,474 library holdings.WorldCat Identities

Padden, Carol
/ref> Several of her publications were created with her husband and co-author,

. * ''Open Your Eyes: Deaf Studies Talking'' * ''A Basic Course in American Sign Language'' (TJ Publishers, 1980) * * ''Learning American Sign Language'' (Allyn & Bacon, 1991, 2nd ed. 2003) *

References

External links

* *
"Sign Language Linguistics – A Conversation with Carol Padden"
''Ideas Roadshow'', 2015
Video of Carol Padden in the RIT/NTID Deaf Studies Archive
{{DEFAULTSORT:Padden, Carol 1955 births Living people Linguists of sign languages MacArthur Fellows People from Washington, D.C. University of California, San Diego faculty Deaf writers American deaf people Women linguists Fellows of the Linguistic Society of America