The Coolidge Corner Theatre

$9.75 regular admission
$7.75 seniors/students/Museum of Science members
FREE to Coolidge members

This cinema classic from legendary director Francois Truffaut is based on a true story of a feral boy found wandering naked and alone in the forests of southern France in 1798. Presumed to have grown up without human contact and unable to speak or communicate, he is taken to the National Institute for the Deaf in Paris, where he attracts the attention of an idealistic and ambitious doctor named Jean Itard (played to great effect by Truffaut himself). Itard brings the boy, whom he christens Victor, into his home, where he patiently, determinedly attempts to teach him language and a sense of morality. Although Victor responds in some measure to Itard’s efforts to educate and socialize him, in the end the wild child remains an enigma. Jean-Pierre Cargol, a French boy chosen from among 2,500 hopefuls, is mesmerizing in the title role. (1970, 1h:23m, in French with English subtitles).

Truffaut’s deeply moving film, beautifully shot in black and white, is notable not only for its cinematic mastery, but also for its fascinating exploration of human learning and language development. Joining us before the film for a talk on language acquisition is Dr. Judy Shepard-Kegl, a full professor in the Linguistics Department at the University of Southern Maine, where she teaches linguistics and interpreting, directs the Signed Language Research Laboratory, and coordinates the ASL/English Interpreting Track of the linguistics major.

Dr. Shepard-Kegl has published extensively on the linguistics and neurolinguistics of American Sign Language and English, but she is perhaps best known for her discovery and documentation of an emerging signed language in Nicaragua in the mid 1980s. Her work ties into the film on many levels, including the fact that of the more than 4,000 Deaf individuals she studies, 450 were language isolates at her first contact with them..

Dr. Shepard Kegl, who holds a PhD from MIT, has held academic posts at Hampshire College, Northeastern, Princeton, Swarthmore, and Rutgers, and has been awarded numerous research grants from the National Science Foundation and The National Institutes of Health.

Dr. Shepard-Kegl’s presentation will be translated into American Sign Language by Joan Wattman, CSC, CI and CT, SC:L, a private interpreter and part-time instructor at Northeastern University.