News Article: "Deaf student performs in Thornwood"

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Title

News Article: "Deaf student performs in Thornwood"

Catalog Entry

This cutout of a newspaper article written in 1997 also includes a picture of a former Fitchburg State College student, Andrea Gorton. She was a freshman in the special education major. The newspaper article explains her involvement in a school production. Due to lack of information that the text has given me, I also had an interview with Professor Kelly Morgan. Morgan was very helpful with information about Andrea and the theater department’s history.

Andrea was very passionate about performing, as well as creating an equal learning environment for everyone around her. She was known for standing up for equal rights. She was also passionate about change on campus. Andrea was deaf and used American Sign Language for communication. Starting off college she wanted to participate in theater, she knew it would be a challenge, but it didn't stop her from trying new things. After all, she was already managing her homework, C.E.S., and teaching sign language in the sign language club. She was given the opportunity to be in the play Thornwood. The performance is about a school teacher going through some struggles of his own and his group of diverse English students performing Hamlet. Andra was cast for the role of Stephanie.

The Director, Morgan, guided Andrea throughout the entirety of the play, such as helping her with her cues and explaining everything in sign language. Kelly, along with different playwrights, made adjustments as needed to ensure Andrea could perform to her best ability, using physical cues like touching the face to make sure she knew when to perform. After a while, she knew what to do without the cues due to how many times they practiced.

Not mentioned in the article, but this was Morgan’s first time directing a play at Fitchburg State and took around six months to rehearse and then three months of performance. They switched off casts every weekend to keep the audience intrigued. Although Andrea was deaf, the cast and the audience never saw her as a burdenl they viewed her as a positive addition. Larry, a blind character in the cast, was not respected the same as Andrea was. With his disability it was harder to navigate himself around in the play and also around campus. He would not be notified when campus construction was going on. People would tease him and treat him completely different then others. Larry was also one of the students performing in the Hamlet play so he was very important to the cast.

Having two casts for this play made the audience’s appreciation different. Once the deaf community figured out that there was an added deaf character they knew they had to share t​heir support. After seeing the performance they felt so empowered and believed that a person that had full hearing would not portray the character as well. They thought the play would not be as powerful. 

An important message that came from the re-interpretation of Thornwood was that the director wanted people to have a moment of realization when they watched the play. Before seeing this performance a lot of people did not know what to expect. Communication between characters proves that deaf people can express their emotions and feelings like hearing people do. Using different facial expressions such as raising eyebrows gives more personality to a character. People are very ignorant about the deaf community because they lack information. Another point is that when people see a person with a disability, they could be afraid of confrontation. They are unaware of how to communicate or the reaction they could get, which could really hinder someone from creating a friendship. Some people choose to completely ignore someone that's different, but with this play they emphasized the fact that they are just another character and human being.

Catalog Entry Author(s)

Kylli Wade, Student, Fitchburg State University

Editor(s)

Nathaniel Felix, Student, Fitchburg State University

Collection

Citation

“News Article: "Deaf student performs in Thornwood",” Cultural Heritage through Image, accessed March 29, 2024, https://culturalheritagethroughimage.omeka.net/items/show/109.

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