Tribes follows Billy, a deaf man raised inside the fiercely idiosyncratic and unrepentantly politically incorrect cocoon of his home in his parents' house. He has adapted brilliantly to his hearing family’s unconventional ways, but they’ve never bothered to return the favor. It’s not until he meets Sylvia, a young woman on the brink of deafness, that he finally understands what it means to be understood.
What Is the Story of Tribes?
Tribes centers around a British couple and their three adult children—Daniel, Billy and Ruth, all of whom live at home. While the family engages in loud, heated and often politically incorrect debates around the dinner table, Billy, who is deaf from birth but has learned to read lips, tries desperately to catch up on the conversation. But because he can’t pick up the intricacies of the dialogue, Billy feels isolated and lonely. When he falls in love with Sylvia, a deaf woman who teaches him sign language, he learns an entirely new way to communicate his feelings, creating turmoil and confusion for his family.
