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Bilingual Deaf Education in the South
of Brazil
Carlos Skliar
Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
Ronice Muller Quadros
Universidade Federal de Santa Caterina, Brazil
This paper presents an analysis of Bilingual Deaf Education in Brazil, with parti-
cular reference to the South of the country. This subject is presented in context,
and takes into account research carried out over the last 5–7 years. We consider the
spread of bilingual=bicultural models, changes in the representation of Deaf people
and Deafness and finally, the epistemological inversion of Deaf and Hearing ‘pro-
blems’ as present in the discussion related to Deaf Education in Brazil. The analyses
of the experience in Brazil are not simple. In fact, the complexity is related to the dif-
ferent possible readings that ‘Bilingual Deaf Education’ can have, such as for
instance, methodological, linguistic and psycholinguistic interpretations, all of
which are considered in the present paper. In addition, we describe certain bilingual
experiences that we have been engaged in, together with other Deaf researchers and
Deaf teachers over the last decade.
Keywords: bilingualism, deafness, Deaf Education, Brazil
Introduction
Over the last 30 years, many changes have taken place in Deaf Education in
Brazil, relating to issues such as ideological conceptions, educational organisa-
tion, Deaf empowerment, Deaf people in Deaf Education teams, the status of
Brazilian Sign Language, and Portuguese as a second language, among others.
Skliar (2001) selects three specific contributions of these changes that he main-
tains need to be considered in detail:
(1) the spread of a bilingual=bicultural model applied to Deaf Education;
(2) changes in the representations of Deafness and Deaf people;
(3) the epistemological inversion of what the Deaf ‘problem’ is in relation to
hearing ‘problems’ in Deaf Education.
These three contributions can be seen as part of the bilingual movement in
Brazil, considering that bilingualism was and is related to policies, in the sense
of action, selected to guide decisions about Deaf Education. Thus, this is far
more than just a type of educational proposal for Deaf people.
Bilingualism in Deaf Education in Brazil
Deaf Bilingual Education can be defined as a complex phenomenon, since it
reflects policies, power and knowledge (in Foucault’s (1980) sense). It is not
just the presence of two languages, in our case, Brazilian Sign Language and
1367-0050/04/05 368-13 $20.00/0 #2004 C. Skliar & R.M. Quadros
BILINGUAL EDUCATION AND BILINGUALISM Vol. 7, No. 5, 2004
368
Brazilian Portuguese, but involves ambiguity and relativity of truth. There is
ambiguity, since the concept of Deaf Bilingual Education can be defined in
different ways, often revealing antagonisms; and there is relativity of truth
(including the minimal definition –two languages), because Deaf Bilingual
Education presupposes a negation of more classical conceptions in the history
of Deaf Education.
In Brazil three different readings of the bilingual=bicultural model as
applied to Deaf Education may be postulated: first, a methodological reading;
second, a linguistic reading; and third, a psycholinguistic reading. The first
reading involves applying the model as an academic system that has come
to replace Total Communication as opposed to Oral Education, without
reviewing the rules and the curriculum, or the Deaf person in the educational
process. On the other hand, the linguistic and psycholinguistic views of Deaf
Bilingual Education are concerned with the acquisition of language and the
lexical, semantic and syntactic relations of the different modalities of the
languages involved. This much-needed and meaningful discussion is crucial
for Deaf Education, although it can also blur other important points such
as, academic programmes, literacy, the relation between education=work,
Deaf empowerment, the education of new professionals, mechanisms of
exclusion=inclusion, and power relations. It is interesting to note that all these
readings have kept, and still keep, a focus on the Deaf child and do not
consider teenagers and adults.
In fact, bilingual education should only be the starting point of Deaf
education, since it is the beginning of policies about Deaf identity, Deaf
and hearing knowledge and power, Deaf resistance movements, ideologies,
hegemonic discourses, school roles and public policies. We cannot ignore all
the aspects involved in Deaf Bilingual Education. This is well-known with
respect to spoken languages in various countries in which there are bilin-
gual=multilingual contexts (Collier & Thomas, 1989; Cummins, 1992, 1996;
Cummins & Swain, 1986; Grosjean, 1982; Veltman, 1988). The implicit
aims of Bilingual Education in the world have to be considered. Aspects
such as assimilating individuals or groups into mainstream society, aiming
at socialising people into full participation in the community, and unifying
a multilingual community, endeavouring to bring unity to a multi-ethnic, or
multinational linguistically diverse policy, are examples of what can be con-
sidered as the basis of bilingualism.
In this sense, the political has a double value: first, as a historical, cultural
and social construction of perspectives on Deafness which are based on dis-
courses, and as power and knowledge relations in the process. Then, we can
find Deaf policies with language, identity and body pressures (Davis, 1997).
This can be understood as ‘hearing’practices (Skliar, 1997, 1998) in which
Deaf people are talked to by hearing people, being forced to be talked to
and seen as hearing beings; in other words, being colonised (Quadros & Perlin,
2003).
Therefore, a bilingual focus should encompass more than merely edu-
cational proposals. There needs to be an investigation into the power mechan-
isms of the relations inside and outside the Deaf school and Deaf education in
general. In this way, bilingual education is a proposal that is related to human
Bilingual Deaf Education in the South of Brazil 369
rights. Sign language, in this view, is the language of Deaf people and the
language of the school. It is the language in which the Deaf child will formu-
late hypotheses about the world, criticise, talk about emotions and discuss
issues, as his or her right.
The next point considered by Skliar (2001), refers to the changes in the repre-
sentations of Deafness and Deaf people observed over the last 30 years in
Brazil. These ideas are opposed to the oralist conceptions in vogue at the
beginning of the ’80s, but this is not a simple opposition. The conceptualisation
of certain bilingual proposals in Brazil still reflect intrinsic oralist policies. This
is the present picture in Brazil. The discourses and practices are like networks
with asymmetric power and knowledge relations about Deaf people and Deaf-
ness. The meanings and symbolic systems produce representations about
Deafness and about Deaf bilingual education that are based on traditional con-
ceptions, which use sign language as a tool for the dissemination of the official
culture and language.
Skliar (2001), therefore, proposes to define Deafness according to the follow-
ing four dimensions: as political difference; as visual experience; as multiple
identities; and as located in the discourse of ‘handicap’.
In the first dimension, Deafness as political difference, it is very common
to find different ways to identify the Deaf by using euphemisms such as
‘special needs’,‘people with special needs’,‘diversity’,‘difference’. These
terms seem to be examples of meanings that share various similarities. Deaf
people are defined by meanings based on normality being invented, rein-
vented and produced by ‘hearing’people. This happens because the norm
is implicit and invisible; and, as a consequence of this invisibility, it is con-
sidered non-existent. We have found a preference for the term ‘diversity’
in Brazilian official documents. This reflects a traditional strategy that blurs
the meaning of cultural differences. The ambiguity of the term ‘diversity’
leads, at best, to the acceptance of some degree of pluralism related to the
ideal norm. However, all these terms are only ways to minimise conceptions
that are still reproducing old frontiers of exclusion. We define Deafness as
political difference, not only to replace all the adjectives used up to now,
but as a clear option based on several analyses (for instance, those carried
out by Bhabha, 1994 and McLaren, 1995). In this sense, difference is politi-
cally, historically and socially constructed; differences are always differences,
and differences exist even if there is no authorisation, acceptance, respect, or
permission from normality.
With respect to the second dimension, understanding Deafness as differ-
ence, this implies recognising visual experiences that involve much more than
cognitive and linguistic abilities. This leads to all kinds of cultural and com-
munity manifestations, including, of course, sign language. For instance, we
use the term ‘The Deaf Way’to refer to other people with name signs based
on visual features; the use of visual metaphors about aesthetic information;
the production of visual humour; the resistance movement with visual mani-
festation; the expression of the meaning of time in a visual way in space, visual
mechanisms and didactics, and visual literature. The Deaf Way of understand-
ing and producing knowledge is not the main point of educational discus-
sions. However, it should occupy a space in the proposals and design of
370 Bilingual Education and Bilingualism
Deaf education, since it plays a crucial role in communication, didactics,
curriculum and intellectual processes.
The third dimension, defining Deafness as multiple Deaf identities, forces us
to consider the ‘Deaf person’not as a person with a unique and complete
identity. Over the last few years, we have detected many deep transformations
in Deaf identity, reflecting policies, cultural and social movements, and
changes in the economy. All these seem to interfere clearly or implicitly in
stereotypes of Deafness, especially in Deaf identities that change from time
to time, according to different cultures, geographic space, historical times,
change in agreement with different people etc. (Moura, 1999; Perlin, 1998).
Thus, the Deaf community should be understood not only in its plural forms,
but also in its fragments of identity. In this sense, we are moving towards
understanding Deafness from a political perspective, that is, focusing on estab-
lished power relations. The ‘movement of identity’takes place in the meeting
of Deaf–Deaf, that is, when Deaf people meet other Deaf people, and where
space is organised in a different way. Also, this movement happens in discur-
sive environments. Then, Deaf people will start to talk by themselves, to judge,
to remember, to recognise and to perceive in different ways and, in so doing,
establish new identities. As mentioned by Wrigley (1996), Deaf people invent
Deafness by themselves.
The last way to define Deafness is as located in the discourse of ‘handicap’.
When talking about handicaps, people locate the discussion in a Special Edu-
cation context that is considered to be a part (or sub area) of Education. Deaf-
ness is analysed as a small part of the huge problem that surrounds Education
in general. This small part is related to taking care of the people who are not as
able as ‘normal people’are, since these people are handicapped with unfortu-
nate families and sacrificial professionals –the specialists. Special Education
manifests discontinuity in its theoretical discourses and is related much more
to charity, aid and medical practices, and, in doing so, reproduces exclusion
based on the binary relation of inclusion=exclusion. Over the last 10 years,
the dominant ideology of Deaf Education seems to be dissatisfied with this
view, in the light of the Deaf Way. The handicap definition is not the way
to think about Deaf people; instead the epistemological way is considered
the best to capture Deaf identities.
Even when we are completely against the idea of Special Education, we
have to consider that this definition still has a very strong influence on us.
Therefore, the impossibility of passing planning proposals, which see the Deaf
person as handicapped, and not as a person with visual experiences, as
defined earlier, needs to be discussed. This means that if educational profes-
sionals continue with their discourses, trying to maintain the notion of Special
Education, it is impossible to think of a Deaf Way.
After defining Deafness, the last aspect mentioned by Skliar (2001), is
epistemological inversion: the Deaf ‘problem’is, in fact, hearing ‘problems’
in Deaf Education. This involves consideration of the problems that the
hearing people suffer in their social, communicative and linguistic inter-
actions with Deaf people. These are problems derived from the invention
of the Deaf alter. For instance, from the cultural point of view, there is
the problem related to the perception of who Deaf people are. Hearing
Bilingual Deaf Education in the South of Brazil 371
specialists or teachers have problems when planning their classes to under-
stand ‘the other’,–the Deaf person. In other words, instead of continuing
to try to understand hearing impairment, they need to understand the
(political) meaning of hearing normality. Instead of thinking that sign
language is a problem, they need to analyse the hearing discourse that
represents this language as a problem. Instead of thinking that Deaf people
are handicapped, they need to understand that the Deaf live a visual
experience in the world.
Following this order of ideas, we can also invert the problem of Bilingual
Education. Before trying to decide whether Deaf people are bilingual, whether
sign language is their first language, whether there is something called ‘Deaf
culture’, whether there should be divisions between children and Deaf adults,
whether the school should be special or regular, whether Deaf people should
or should not be teachers, whether they are different from hearing people,
etc, we should ask: what kind of problems do we, as hearing people,
have when we think of Bilingual Education? Which mechanisms have we, as
hearing people, invented to understand Deaf bilingualism? What are our
representations of Deafness and Deaf people within and beyond educational
practices and discourses? And, finally, what are the power and knowledge
relations that we maintain or negate in our relations as hearing people with
Deaf people?
The bilingual experience in the South of Brazil: Educational work from
the viewpoint of the Deaf adult, and the establishment of a network of
Deaf Education
We have been thinking and writing since 1996 about the existence of certain
variables in Deaf Bilingual Education in the South of Brazil, incorporating
Deaf views to make academic projects more complex and significant (Perlin,
1998, 2000; Quadros, 1997a, 1997b, 2000; Skliar, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001). These
variables follow from the pedagogic pathways in which Deaf people are
inserted, established both from a historical and forward-looking bilingual
proposal. They are the following:
(1) the reconstruction of the problems that govern bilingual education for
Deaf people by inverting the ‘hearing’logic of Deaf education in which
the problem would be exactly the Deaf themselves, and heading towards
another multi-dimensional analysis of the educational process;
(2) the circulation of the meanings and representations around Deafness and
Deaf people in specific educational contexts;
(3) the participation of Deaf adults in the planning, development and evalu-
ation of bilingual policies;
(4) the continuity of the educational project;
(5) the revision of school architectures and ideologies; and, finally,
(6) the structure and sequence of pedagogical goals.
This set of variables has opened new doors for Deaf Bilingual Education
in the South of Brazil. In the first place, the transformation of the view that
372 Bilingual Education and Bilingualism
a bilingual education is not only an academic project, but is intimately
associated with the politics of linguistics, identity, culture and differences.
In the second place, and perhaps one of the most important aspects,
bilingual education supposes two pathways for Deaf people. One is a peda-
gogical pathway with which the Deaf child is engaged until he=she
becomes an adult. The second is a pathway that goes from the Deaf adult
to the Deaf child. What does it mean to go from the Deaf adult to the Deaf
child? It means that we cannot ignore the systematic qualification of Deaf
adults as educational professionals and the many generations of Deaf adults
who were not able to radically change their historical condition of illiteracy,
low academic results and low quality of life: no jobs, sub-jobs, etc. Also, it
means that the school should be preparing for the time in which the Deaf
child and Deaf adult can meet each other, and that the school should
be considering the qualifications of Deaf people to play a role in Deaf
Education.
Since 1996, in the South of Brazil, our focus has been specifically on this
issue. Nowadays, community, undergraduate and graduate courses and pro-
jects are being organised and created to prepare Deaf people to be teachers of
Brazilian Sign Language, and specific areas, such as literacy of Deaf teenagers
and Deaf adults, arts and cultural manifestations. The main aim of all these
initiatives is no other than to significantly transform the situation of the
present generations of Deaf people in Brazil, in order to lead to autonomy
of the Deaf in the political and education arenas; in other words, in order to
facilitate Deaf empowerment. Almost all the Deaf people engaged in the pro-
cess described here, are from Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina (the two
states in the South of Brazil), but some come from the countryside and other
large cities.
To offer a picture of Brazilian reality in terms of Deaf Education, we would
describe the situation in the following terms. Brazil has a political policy of
public (state) education in mainstream schools. The control of this position
cuts across the regional administration that puts forward different positions
across Brazil. This means that there are different understandings of what the
‘inclusion’of Deaf people in mainstream schools really means. In Rio Grande
do Sul, there are about ten Deaf Schools that make the difference in terms of
Deaf Education. These schools have had systematic discussions about what
Deaf people want in terms of education. Some of them have had support from
the universities in the understanding of how to implement Deaf Education in a
‘Deaf way’.
In Santa Catarina, there is no Deaf school in the entire state. However,
there are a group of 32 Deaf people studying Deaf Education on an under-
graduate course in a public university –Universidade Estadual de Santa Cat-
arina, UDESC –in order to be able to teach Deaf children. The Deaf students
are aware of the state context and they have been discussing the future of
Deaf Education in their state and in Brazil as a whole. These future Deaf tea-
chers, together with teachers or future teachers from Rio Grande do Sul,
have been meeting to analyse the situation and to make proposals about
Deaf Education in systematic forums. There is also a plan developed by
these Deaf groups which presents the priorities of Deaf Education
Bilingual Deaf Education in the South of Brazil 373
(Documento do l Semin
aario Nacional de Surdos, 2001) that is partially trans-
lated as follows:
Ist National Deaf Seminar – Caxias do Sul=RioGrandeDoSul–27–29
September, 2001 – The Deaf View on Educational Practices
Group 3 – Deaf education
Infant Education
(1) How to prepare the Deaf child in the first years of schooling.
(2) What is the curriculum of Deaf children in their first years at school?
(3) To offer access to Brazilian Sign Language to Deaf children of hearing
families.
Primary Education
(1) What are the best practices of primary education?
(2) To develop curriculum proposals for Deaf Education in Sign Language.
(3) To find out about literacy processes, the reading and writing of Portu-
guese for Deaf people.
Secondary Education
(1) To find out about Education and Work.
Adult Education
(1) To make Deaf Adults literate.
Undergraduate Education
(1) To identify didactic strategies and specific dynamics of classes for the
Deaf.
Group 4 – Deaf education boundaries
(1) To find out about the laws and their implications in Deaf Education.
(2) To investigate education and the politics of social inclusion and
exclusion.
(3) To have a critical view on the relation between Deaf Education and
Special Education.
(4) To find out about political projects and institutional projects related to
Deafness.
(5) To consider conceptual models of Deafness and Deaf people: the clinical,
the anthropological and the difference model.
(6) To distinguish the discourse and the practice of ‘hearing impairment’in
Education.
(7) To find out how ‘disability discourse’functions in Education.
(8) To discover traditional curriculums in Deaf Education: practices and
discourses.
(9) To provide an introduction to the Critical Theory of the Curriculum.
(10) To study curriculum, ideology, language, power, culture and politics.
(11) To identify strategies of the Pedagogy of Difference.
374 Bilingual Education and Bilingualism
These priorities reflect resistance movements from Deaf groups in the country.
They have also discussed sign language acquisition, sign language teaching,
technology, signwriting, family intervention and mental and physical health.
In Deaf Rights forums in Santa Catarina, Deaf people have proposed certain
guidelines for Deaf Education that are partially translated as follows (Dire-
trizes e Ac¸o
˜es para a Educac¸a
˜o de Surdos em Santa Catarina, 2000).
Reconstruction of the politics of Deaf Education in Santa Catarina
(1) The creation of a Reference Centre for Deaf Education in teaching, research
and extension to the community: recognition of Visual and Spatial Deaf
Experience; production of research about cultures, identities, differences,
visual methodologies, linguistics, education; to give support for instruction
of the Deaf and hearing professionals; to give support for sign language
interpreters; to teach courses open to the community in general about Deaf
Education, Deaf Culture and Identities, Sign Language.
(2) Starting groups of Deaf students in central regular schools at all
educational levels with Deaf teachers, bilingual teachers and sign lan-
guage interpreters, with a visual-based structure and methodology
(Pedagogy of Difference).
There is also a National Deaf Association (Federac¸a
˜o Nacional de Educac¸a
˜o
e Integrac¸a
˜o de Surdos – FENEIS) that has been fighting for more than
10 years for the recognition of sign language. Last year, a federal law (Lei
10.436, 24=04=2002) recognised Brazilian Sign Language as an official
language in the country. This has been reflected directly in Deaf Education.
Since then, it seems more appropriate to consider Deaf Education within
the context of groups that have different languages from Brazilian Portuguese
in Education in general, instead of relating it to the context of Special
Education.
To offer a quantitative dimension of the research projects that have been car-
ried out recently across the south of the country, we would say that currently
there are about 100 Deaf students studying on different undergraduate courses,
four Deaf students working on their Masters theses and three working on their
doctoral dissertations in Education, about 95 Deaf teenagers and Deaf adults
involved in popular education programmes, in the process of becoming liter-
ate, and 40 Deaf teachers of Brazilian Sign Language, among others. Also, there
are specific projects being planned to guarantee Deaf people becoming quali-
fied as professionals, particularly in areas of Education. These include an
undergraduate major in Brazilian Sign Language and Brazilian Portuguese, a
graduate major in Deaf Education and another in the translation and interpre-
tion of Brazilian Sign Language and Brazilian Portuguese. These fields of study
are being organised, thanks to the work of several organisations such as: the
Federac¸a
˜o Nacional de Educac¸a
˜o e Integrac¸a
˜o de Surdos – FENEIS, the Universidade
Federal de Santa Catarina – UFSC, the Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do
Sul – UFRGS, and the Centro Federal de Formac¸a
˜o Tecnol
oogica – CEFET=SC. More-
over, as mentioned above, an undergraduate major in Deaf Education is
already being offered, in the Universidade Estadual de Santa Catarina – UDESC
–with 32 Deaf students, and the training of qualified sign language
Bilingual Deaf Education in the South of Brazil 375
interpreters and Deaf sign language teachers financed by the Ministe
´rio de
Educac¸a
˜o e Cultura (the highest federal educational organisation in Brazil)
together with the organisations previously mentioned.
In addition, there are two research groups in Deaf Studies, one from Univer-
sidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, and the other from Universidade
Federal of Santa Catarina, which are carrying out different investigations.
Some of them are briefly described below:
(1) Policies of the relationships between Deaf Education, Cultural Studies
and Deaf Studies, Deaf identity, Deaf culture, the definition of a Deaf per-
son, and Deaf community organisation are some topics that have been
studied by Deaf and hearing students in the context of the logical inver-
sion process (Miranda, 2001; Perlin, 2000; Quadros & Perlin, 2003).
(2) Deaf families are a complex topic. Cenzi (2002) presents a study identify-
ing the representations of hearing parents, of sign language, and identi-
ties by their Deaf children.
(3) Infant Deaf Education, Teenager Deaf Education, Adult Deaf Education.
There are different groups from Deaf schools analysing their practices
and rethinking how to implement Deaf Education in each specific con-
text. The discussions include Deaf claims, the political situation, teacher
qualifications and the pedagogic and philosophical plans of the school.
The main questions are: Who are the Deaf adults who have studied in
our schools? Who do we want to educate for what? What do we, Deaf
and hearing people, think about Deaf Education? It is interesting that
the main points from Deaf claims about Deaf Education are related to
access to information with quality in their language and Deaf teachers.
The schools participating in this process are starting to realise that they
are not good schools for Deaf people and, so, they are beginning to
make plans and try to work out ways of changing the situation. These
depend on each individual case, rather than being general proposals.
For instance, in one of the Deaf public schools in Rio Grande do Sul,
the group decided that they should have Deaf teachers participating
in Deaf Education. They did not have any Deaf teachers with formal
qualifications at that time, so they started looking for someone who
might be a good Education Professional. They found a Deaf man and
he quit his original job to assume a position as a kind of teacher in a spe-
cial situation, with the mayor
´s agreement. At the same time, he started
to study, in order to be able to regularise his position at the school. Also,
in the meantime, the town administration created a position for Deaf
teachers with a specific qualification to work in Deaf schools. After
about 8 years, he and three more Deaf teachers had normal teaching
posts. Nowadays, there is a real possibility of being able to offer more
posts for Deaf teachers in the future.
(4) Distance Deaf Education is a new area in Brazil. There is a huge project
planning education at undergraduate and graduate levels through
e-learning. This project is justified since the professionals who could
become teachers in the programmes are spread over the country (and
Brazil is a big country). This also makes sense, since Deaf students from
376 Bilingual Education and Bilingualism
different regions need to have access to education, which they currently
do not have.
(5) The training and qualification of Deaf professionals is a concern of the
Deaf people who have already been educated. They want to keep
studying and get qualified. There are some Deaf professionals who have
started graduate courses, especially, in the field of Education.
(6) Translation and interpretation of Brazilian Sign Language and Brazilian
Portuguese is very important in the process. Deaf people are aware of
the importance of having qualified interpreters. Because of this, some
programmes to begin the training of interpreters have been started and
currently there is a project to offer a programme for interpreters both at
undergraduate and graduate major level. The latest programme to begin,
the training of qualified sign language interpreters who already work as
interpreters without any specific qualification, was offered to 60 people in
the Ministe
´rio de Educac¸a
˜o e Cultura. One or two of these are from each
state in the country. We have 27 states with completely different realities
in terms of education in general, in terms of Deaf organisations, and in
terms of sign language recognition. Although it was eclectic, at the same
time, it represented a starting point for sign language interpreter qualifi-
cation in the country.
(7) Brazilian Sign Language as part of the definition of the Deaf person has
been a subject of recent research (Miranda, 2001; Perlin, 2000; Quadros,
1997a; Quadros & Perlin, 2003; Skliar & Quadros, 2000; Souza, 1998). It
is already clear to people working in related areas that sign language is
very important for the constitution of Deaf identities and cultures, but
it is still unclear what to do with this difference in Education from the
public and political point of view. To recognise difference is not difficult,
but to plan what to do with difference is much more complex.
(8) Teaching Brazilian Sign Language as a first language, teaching Brazilian
Sign Language as a second language, Brazilian Sign Language acqui-
sition, Brazilian Sign Language grammar are some of the special issues
that Deaf people are interested in investigating. They have begun to
realise that each of these aspects requires specific research. They are also
aware of specific methodologies organised in a Deaf way based on visual
experiences.
(9) Specific technological areas in Deaf education have begun to be con-
sidered relevant in Deaf education. There are specific products related
to technology which can be used by students in and out of the class, such
as, software with lessons planned based on the visual experience and in
Brazilian Sign Language (Napoli & Ramirez, 2002). Also, Stumpf (2002) is
developing technology with signwriting, together with sign language and
conceptual representations.
We would also like to mention a special project involving Deaf people from
inland areas in Rio Grande do Sul. The project is mainly aimed at providing
Deaf experiences for Deaf people from the countryside, who have not been
organised as a Deaf community. Some of these Deaf people have never been
in contact with other Deaf people and, therefore, they do not know how to
Bilingual Deaf Education in the South of Brazil 377
sign. This project was started in 1999 with very impressive results. In small cit-
ies, Deaf organisations started to be created and to connect with other Deaf
organisations, constituting a network of different Deaf experiences. Moreover,
they started to become literate as part of the educational programme. Miranda
(2001) presented an analysis of this process showing the importance of the
Deaf meeting with their peers and how sign language is the way to make
all this possible. Nowadays, this project is growing and includes new inland
areas as a State Government project in Rio Grande do Sul, together with the
Universidade Federal de Santa Caterina (UFRGS). Martins (2003) analysed
the building of subjectivity through sign language in these Deaf people,
who had never signed before, when they met Deaf signers. He found that their
lives changed after starting to learn sign language, in that they acquired sign
language, constructed a Deaf identity, recognised themselves as students, and
constructed discourses. Having access to language meant also having access to
the world, becoming a significant actor in this play. The past started to be
reviewed, interpreted and told by them.
Something similar is happening in Santa Catarina, although at regional
levels. There is a project preparing Deaf people from different areas of the state
to become leaders. The aim is to give these Deaf leaders guidelines to organise
the Deaf community in each area of the state. This is already happening in
some places more than in others. This articulation also involves educational
proposals, political issues and the creation of Deaf organisations.
At the same time, we think that Deaf Education depends on the establish-
ment of a network with all the people involved in this process, such as inter-
preters of Brazilian Sign Language, public power, public and private
universities, Deaf and hearing teachers, Deaf organisations and researchers.
Therefore, a discussion forum was created and opened to the community in
two places: at UFRGS, in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, and at CEFET=SC,
in Florian
oopolis. Since 1998, these two forums have been discussing different
themes: the Deaf at university, intellectual Deaf people, teaching Deaf teen-
agers in the middle school, laws to officially recognise sign language in differ-
ent areas of the country, the political organisation of the Deaf community and
the participation of Deaf people in decisions about Deaf education. These for-
ums have had an impact on growing Deaf political participation in society and
they have made a difference to actions in Deaf Education. Deaf people are now
participating actively in the decisions about their claims and rights.
Final Comments
We are sure that Deaf Education involves all these paths. It does not
involve only discussion on language, but this subject is complex and
involves a rich interplay of many, often subtle, details, as we have tried to
show here. The present is an ambiguous time, with changes in the meaning
of the representations of Deafness, Deaf people, Deaf Education. It is the
time of the epistemological inversion of what the Deaf ‘problem’is to hear-
ing ‘problems’in Deaf Education. Deaf claims have started to be recognised
by some of the hearing professionals and hearing state governors. They
have started to realise the complexity of Deaf Education. Deaf leaders are
378 Bilingual Education and Bilingualism
continually fighting to show what they want, what they believe and what
they are doing. Deaf people are engaged in the process; they are political
people with fluctuating identities acting in the play of life. In presenting
the South of Brazil experience, we feel that bilingualism in Deaf Education
has to be the starting point to make Deaf people’s rights possible, in order
for them to live as true citizens.
Correspondence
Any correspondence should be directed to Dr Carlos Skliar, Universidade
Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil (skliar@piaget.edu.ufrgs.br).
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