Edna Simon Levine was born November 29, 1910, in New York City, New York. Levine began her career focusing on the deaf after training as a teacher at the Lexington School for the Deaf in Manhattan, New York. She then went on to receive her bachelor’s, master’s (1939), and doctorate (1948) in clinical psychology from New York State University. She earned a second master’s degree in special education in 1951 from the Teacher’s College at Columbia University. She received an honorary degree from Gallaudet in 1969. Levine taught educational psychology for 15 years at New York State University. Her prime objective as a Psychologist of the deaf was helping the deaf cope with social isolation.

Levine was also an author, researcher, clinician, advocate, and trainer of other professionals in the field of deafness. Levine had over 36 pieces of her work published in magazines, journals, and/or newspaper articles; her published books include Youth in a Soundless World (1956), Psychology of Deafness (1960), Lisa and Her Soundless World (1974), and Ecology of Early Deafness (1981). Levine also helped organize the first comprehensive dictionary of sign language in 1964.

In 1972 Levine directed a United Nations Task Force on Deafness and a 1974 national conference on training psychological workers of the deaf. She initiated the New York State Psychiatric Institute’s mental health program for the deaf and founded New York University’s research and training center for deafness and deafness rehabilitation. She also formed the Deaf Repertory Theater, helped create the Foundation for the Deaf, and worked on adapting telephones for the deaf which included experiments with videophones.

Furthermore, Levine was a president of the Psychology Commission of the World Federation of the Deaf and a former board member of the American Psychological Association, the American Hearing Society, the Inter-Branch Library Association of New York, and the New York League for the Hard of Hearing.

Edna Simon Levine passed on April 7th, 1992.