Garrick Mallery

author

Garrick Mallery

1831–1894

A pioneering American ethnologist, he brought careful attention to Native American sign languages and pictographs, helping establish them as important subjects of scientific study. His work connected visual communication with the broader human story of language.

3 Audiobooks

Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes First Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1879-1880, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1881, pages 263-552

Sign Language Among North American Indians Compared With That Among Other Peoples And Deaf-Mutes First Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1879-1880, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1881, pages 263-552

by Garrick Mallery

Picture-Writing of the American Indians Tenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888-89, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1893, pages 3-822

Picture-Writing of the American Indians Tenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1888-89, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1893, pages 3-822

by Garrick Mallery

Pictographs of the North American Indians. A preliminary paper Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1882-83, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1886, pages 3-256

Pictographs of the North American Indians. A preliminary paper Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1882-83, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1886, pages 3-256

by Garrick Mallery

About the author

Born in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, in 1831, Garrick Mallery practiced law in Philadelphia before the American Civil War. He served in the U.S. Army, where his experiences in frontier regions helped spark his lasting interest in Native American sign language and pictography.

After retiring from the military in 1879, Mallery became one of the first ethnologists appointed to the newly created Bureau of American Ethnology. He collected sign-language vocabularies from Native American communities across the United States and Canada and worked to understand signs and pictographs as widespread forms of human communication.

His influential studies included Introduction to the Study of Sign Languages Among the North American Indians and research on American Indian picture writing. He died in Washington, D.C., in 1894.