Reviews
Hands of My Father: A Hearing Boy, His Deaf Parents, and the Language of Love by Myron Uhlberg
cerebellum's review
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
3.75
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death of parent
pussreboots's review
5.0
Hands of My Father by Myron Uhlberg is another one that has been on my list since it was first released. I think I heard about the book on NPR or somewhere similar but I'm not sure. Deafness and sign language has been an interest of mine since high school. I had a friend who was learning ASL for her volunteer work.
Myron Uhlberg was born during the Depression as a hearing child to deaf parents. Though both parents were fluent in American sign (or the precursor of it as Uhlberg explains), their families were not and their Brooklyn neighborhood wasn't exactly understanding or welcoming of deafness. As soon as Uhlberg could walk and talk he became his parents' translator, and later keeper of his epileptic brother.
The memoir is a good mixture of his memories of growing up in Brooklyn, his thoughts on how his parents taught him to talk (they kept a radio running by his crib) and how he in turn taught his brother to talk. Mixed together with all those memories are his observations of how Sign works as a language. As a bilingual speaker he's able to poetically describe the nuances of the language, something most of the text books on the subject I've read don't do (nor attempt to do).
Myron Uhlberg was born during the Depression as a hearing child to deaf parents. Though both parents were fluent in American sign (or the precursor of it as Uhlberg explains), their families were not and their Brooklyn neighborhood wasn't exactly understanding or welcoming of deafness. As soon as Uhlberg could walk and talk he became his parents' translator, and later keeper of his epileptic brother.
The memoir is a good mixture of his memories of growing up in Brooklyn, his thoughts on how his parents taught him to talk (they kept a radio running by his crib) and how he in turn taught his brother to talk. Mixed together with all those memories are his observations of how Sign works as a language. As a bilingual speaker he's able to poetically describe the nuances of the language, something most of the text books on the subject I've read don't do (nor attempt to do).
dameofscones's review
3.0
Great book - required reading for a class, but the story was touching, quick, and clearly from the heart of a devoted son. Recommended.
ampersandread's review
3.0
Great book - required reading for a class, but the story was touching, quick, and clearly from the heart of a devoted son. Recommended.
nce14210's review
3.0
Mama will like. Good stories. another like it is Train Go Sorry by Leah Hager Cohen.
grace_theliteraryfiend's review
5.0
This was one of those reads that I didn't know what to expect but found myself completely engrossed and feeling like I had discovered a hidden gem. I love the feeling that you get when you find a book that no one else knows about and all you want to do is tell everyone to read it.
Hands of My Father is the memoir of Myron Uhlberg's childhood growing up the eldest hearing son of two deaf parents during the 1930s and 1940s. Uhlberg narrates his memoir through remembered events and generalizations, recreating the "essence" of conversations between himself and his father. As Uhlberg notes at the beginning of the book "[t]his memoir is how I remember my life growing up with my deaf parents, and to the best of my ability I've made every effort to get right what matters most." In other words, it's not the details that matter as much as the emotion and lasting values that matter. And boy oh boy is this book filled with love.
There are so many things that I liked about this book, the primary one being that Uhlberg expresses nothing but love for his parents, even when writing about things that were annoying to any child, or extra hardships being the eldest hearing son to two deaf parents, Uhlberg never expresses bitterness. These challenges were his reality, they were unique and helped define him, but they never got in the way of the love between himself and his parents. It was refreshing to read a memoir where the focus was on a child's love for his parents, not on how difficult their life was.
Another thing that I loved about this memoir was how Uhlberg was able to explain and express sign language. I don't know much about ASL and Uhlberg was able to shed light on how a person's gestures are as much a part of their personality as it is the same as expressing a specific dialect or accent in spoken language. I found his descriptions of sign to be fascinating and enlightening.
Uhlberg's father worked for the New York Daily News and at one point he even described his first visit to the printing room where his father worked. This brought back a flood of memories of my own childhood, my father also having worked (and still works) for a newspaper. I remember as a child going to the local junior A hockey games and stopping off after the game at the loading zone with my father to check in on how the first run of the paper was going. I would stand beside my father who towers at 6'3", holding his hand and watching as bundles of papers flew down the conveyor belts and were quickly piled into waiting vans ready to be delivered. As anyone who has ever worked on the production end of the newspaper business knows, printing presses are extremely loud, this is still the case today even with more modern technologies. It didn't surprise me to read in Uhlberg's memoir that the newspaper preferred to hire deaf workers to work in the printing room, the noise is truly deafening.
For me this book hit all the right notes. It stirred up in me my own memories of my childhood and tapped into my love for my parents. As Uhlberg seems to understand and celebrate, no parent is perfect, what is important is that they tried their best. For anyone who is looking for a feel good read this is the book for you. It is a fascinating look into deaf culture from the perspective of someone who grew up a part of that world but didn't truly belong. Pick up this book, you won't be disappointed.
Happy Reading Everyone!
Hands of My Father is the memoir of Myron Uhlberg's childhood growing up the eldest hearing son of two deaf parents during the 1930s and 1940s. Uhlberg narrates his memoir through remembered events and generalizations, recreating the "essence" of conversations between himself and his father. As Uhlberg notes at the beginning of the book "[t]his memoir is how I remember my life growing up with my deaf parents, and to the best of my ability I've made every effort to get right what matters most." In other words, it's not the details that matter as much as the emotion and lasting values that matter. And boy oh boy is this book filled with love.
There are so many things that I liked about this book, the primary one being that Uhlberg expresses nothing but love for his parents, even when writing about things that were annoying to any child, or extra hardships being the eldest hearing son to two deaf parents, Uhlberg never expresses bitterness. These challenges were his reality, they were unique and helped define him, but they never got in the way of the love between himself and his parents. It was refreshing to read a memoir where the focus was on a child's love for his parents, not on how difficult their life was.
Another thing that I loved about this memoir was how Uhlberg was able to explain and express sign language. I don't know much about ASL and Uhlberg was able to shed light on how a person's gestures are as much a part of their personality as it is the same as expressing a specific dialect or accent in spoken language. I found his descriptions of sign to be fascinating and enlightening.
Uhlberg's father worked for the New York Daily News and at one point he even described his first visit to the printing room where his father worked. This brought back a flood of memories of my own childhood, my father also having worked (and still works) for a newspaper. I remember as a child going to the local junior A hockey games and stopping off after the game at the loading zone with my father to check in on how the first run of the paper was going. I would stand beside my father who towers at 6'3", holding his hand and watching as bundles of papers flew down the conveyor belts and were quickly piled into waiting vans ready to be delivered. As anyone who has ever worked on the production end of the newspaper business knows, printing presses are extremely loud, this is still the case today even with more modern technologies. It didn't surprise me to read in Uhlberg's memoir that the newspaper preferred to hire deaf workers to work in the printing room, the noise is truly deafening.
For me this book hit all the right notes. It stirred up in me my own memories of my childhood and tapped into my love for my parents. As Uhlberg seems to understand and celebrate, no parent is perfect, what is important is that they tried their best. For anyone who is looking for a feel good read this is the book for you. It is a fascinating look into deaf culture from the perspective of someone who grew up a part of that world but didn't truly belong. Pick up this book, you won't be disappointed.
Happy Reading Everyone!
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