deaf society

deaf society




 Deafness and society: Questions on language comfort and social participation

Inclusion is a topic that is under discussion in the most diverse areas of society (education, culture, leisure, work and health, among others). In this sense, the concept of disability has been changing historically, while social conditions are altered by the action of man himself. This chapter aims to reflect on the conditions of educational inclusion and social participation of the deaf community that uses sign language as the first language - L1. We will speak more deeply about the issues of language comfort, access to cultural and social goods, the exercise of citizenship through their first language (Sign Language) and the use of Portuguese as a second language. The text is organized in the following topics: Deaf children and "linguistic comfort" in the family; "Language comfort": from school context to work; and Social participation: Bilingual deaf people and the alternation of languages. It is understood by linguistic comfort, the situation of a person communicating and interacting with the world, through a language that is natural to him, which gives him the conditions to understand and interpret the world, in a complete and meaningful way. The alternation of languages ​​for Brazilian deaf people is only possible when their schooling is truly based on the principles of quality bilingual education and respect for their natural language, their L1. The presence of a sign language interpreter is a preponderant point in several situations, however, if society is not organized with the aim of providing a level playing field, social participation will not be complete.

1. Introduction

Today, inclusion is a theme that is evident in the most diverse areas of society (education, culture, leisure, work and health, among others) and, therefore, the concept of disability has been changing historically, while social conditions are altered by the action of man himself. According to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE, 2010), 9.8 million Brazilians are hearing impaired. This means that 5.2% of the Brazilian population, of these 2.6 million, are deaf 28.

Although widespread in Brazil, the idea of ​​equal opportunities, according to the directives of the conventions between nations (for example, the Declaration of Salamanca and Jakarta, among other international documents), however, without considering the historical inequalities of social conditions , the opportunities will not be effectively inclusive.

The definition of "social inclusion" is standard as being "the most perfected process of the coexistence of someone, considered as different, with the other members of society, supposed to be the same. In this case, society prepares and modifies itself to receive the disabled person in all areas of the social process (education, health, work, social assistance, accessibility, leisure, sports and culture) (BRASIL, 2007, p. 2).It is wrongly enacted that education can heal all inequalities. However, it is understood that, for the deaf, our society today still can not provide true inclusion, be it in schooling, in training, in work, or in another sphere of human activity, starting from the perspective that few institutions understand their linguistic specificity and are organized to develop communication with deaf people through the Brazilian Sign Language (Libras), which today is legally recognized as the language used by the Brazilian deaf community 29. Without, however, having as premise the education and a quality formation for the deaf, their true inclusion becomes a utopia. Thoma apud Skliar (1998) points out that the education of the deaf undergoes advances and shows the tendency to accept deaf communities from a critical and transforming multicultural perspective. This trend emphasizes that one of the first steps in inclusive education development is to accept cultural diversity regardless of the weighted aspect. Referring to the need for a linguistic policy designed with respect to diversity, and providing linguistic comfort to which the deaf in Brazil are entitled, we refer to Matheus (2010), who explains:

The use and diffusion of a language can be presented in a triple nature: 1) The language as a way of building the person and daily communication of the individual, as the mother tongue. 2) Language as a vehicle for schooling communities that use it as a second language. 3) Language as a spciopolitical and cultural reference in spaces where it is a foreign language (MATEUS, 2002, p.1).

It is understood, then. by linguistic comfort, the situation of a person who communicates and interacts with the world through a language that is natural to him, a language that enables him to understand and interpret the world in a complete and meaningful way, and to make sense in this language. Gomes and Góes (2011) emphasize that when we deal with two such distinct modalities, such as Portuguese and Libras, the competence and linguistic comfort of the first language is always superior to that of the second, for any individual.

Language comfort can also occur in the use of a second language, as long as it is accessible. For the deaf, the majority language, orally speaking, is not completely accessible, that is, it is not easily learned as a second language, just as it is for bilingual listeners, because to comfortably access a language means to be in the world, linguistic and culturally, through it. This bilingual condition does not happen naturally with the Brazilian Deaf people, who, for the most part, live deprived of the production of meaning in the majority language, the Portuguese language, living as foreign apprentices in the use of a second language.

According to Filho and Guzzo (2009: 37), "for a long time the dominant ideology contributes to the diffusion of a negative image of the subject about oneself and others, which gives rise to a pattern of social relationship that is established on the basis of stereotypes" . And when speakers of different languages ​​come together, the resulting linguistic relations are determined to a great extent by the economic and political power of the speakers of each variety (BURROWS, 2010, our translation).

The discussion about linguistic comfort through Libras acquires strength from the recognition of Libras as the first language of the deaf community and, above all, with a foundation in the resistance of this community to the imposition of patterns and the stereotypes created around the deaf subject; and, on the other hand, the discussion of the constitution of bilingual deaf subjects (proficient in Libras and written Portuguese) also favors the alternation or overlapping of languages, and the empowerment of the deaf, socially and politically, about the making of their history. In this way, we organize this text in three subtopics, namely: Deaf children and the "linguistic comfort" in the family; "Language comfort": from school context to work; and "bilingual" deaf people and the alternation of languages.

The purpose of this chapter is, therefore, to reflect on the conditions of educational inclusion and social participation of the deaf community that uses sign language as the first language and, in particular, questions of language comfort and access to cultural and social goods and in the exercise of their citizenship through their first language and the use of a second language.2. Deaf children and "language comfort" in the family

When thinking about the family as the first social nucleus where the constitution of the subject begins, it is necessary to understand that it plays a fundamental role in the life of its members since the psychological and social structure of the human being is mostly constituted in the family:

[...] the family is the most favorable environment for blossoming and the normal development of the human being. Man, when he comes into the world, is the weakest being of all living beings. This fragile existence needs the most meticulous and careful care, of a vigilance at all times (BEACH, 1968, p.15).

In the trajectory of the constitution of the human, the child and the adolescent feel the need for dialogue and the presence of someone who understands them and elucidates the transformations that they spend in their lives. Generally, the children look for, in the figure of the parents, the reference of identity. However, society's own conditions influence family relationships, making it difficult for the family to fulfill its essential duties with adolescents and to follow their own path, obeying their personal inclinations and less subordinate to family influence. In the situation of deafness, in hearing families with children, the affective bonds can be broken already in the discovery of the difference, if not, because the deaf child or adolescent does not find in the house the referential sought.

Carlos Skliar (1995) explains that the deaf person is a different sociolinguistic being, belonging to a minority linguistic community, characterized by sharing the use of a Sign Language and cultural values, habits and modes of socialization. The Sign Language is an agglutinative and identifying element of the deaf, constituting its mode of appropriation with the world, the means of constructing its identity, and through it the deaf puts into operation the faculty of language, inherent in its human condition . Goldfeld (1997), when analyzing language and deafness in a socio-interactionist perspective, recognizes the difficulties of communication between hearing parents and deaf children, due to the linguistic difference between them. In this sense, the process of socialization becomes an obstacle for the deaf, since the family, by the joint activity among its members, would be the first environment of interaction and cooperation that leads the young person to autonomy.

Language, from the beginning of its acquisition, is essentially social; it develops at the level of social interactions, in interpersonal relationships. The hearing person, from birth, is exposed to an oral language. In this way, you have the opportunity to acquire this language as a natural language, which will allow the realization of communicative exchanges, living in situations in your environment and, thus, have an effective language for language construction.

For the deaf child, the acquisition of a natural language that allows the development of language should be opportune. However, there are different family configurations. We know that in Brazil, most deaf children are born in homes of hearing people with parents who do not know sign language and are not prepared to have a deaf child. Therefore, the family configuration is not always favorable for the development of the deaf child in this sense.

From the acquisition of a language, the child begins to construct his subjectivity, since he will have resources for his insertion in the dialogical process of his community, exchanging ideas, feelings, understanding what is happening in his environment and acquiring new conceptions world. In the case of deaf children, daughters of hearing parents, this process does not happen naturally, since the oral-auditory language used by the mother in the interactions with the deaf child does not favor verbal interaction. Under these conditions, the process of acquiring oral language will not be natural for deaf children, as with hearing children.

Góes (1999) points out that stereotyped characterizations, such as concrete thinking, rudimentary conceptual elaboration, low sociability, rigidity, emotional immaturity, etc., were associated with the deaf. Today, even in some contexts, these thoughts persist: they are preconceptions that persist in some social nuclei, from school to work space. This is due to the ignorance that sign language exists for the deaf to communicate and participate as an integral part of their environment, since they have difficulties in acquiring oral language, and sign language is their natural language. There are no reports of deafness being the cause of cognitive and affective limitations, since the real limitation lies in the conditions of the social interactions offered to the deaf subject (DIZEU and CAPORALI, 2005).According to Quadros (1997), Sign Language presents in its structure, abstract systems, grammatical rules and linguistic complexities that organize this system, also containing metaphorical expressions. Quadros also emphasizes that sign language is as complex and expressive as oral language. These two languages, like all others, have their own characteristics, according to nationality and even regionality. According to the author, it comprises a material organization of constituents, closed and conventional, corresponding to the possibilities manifested in a gesture-visual language.

Goldfeld (1997) states that language is always present in the subject, even when the subject is not communicating with other people; thus, it constitutes the subject, the way in which it cuts out and perceives the world and itself. For Vygotsky (1989), the main trajectory of the child's psychological development is a trajectory of progressive individualization, that is, a process that originates in social, interpersonal relationships and transforms into individual and intrapersonal relationships.

In this sense, it reinforces the idea that inclusion does not consist only in obliging teaching institutions to accept the deaf as a student, but rather to give them conditions, through pedagogical projects and support to the family, to develop it through use of his natural language, providing social interaction that does not press him to be equal to the hearers.

The violence to which the deaf are subjected by being deprived of their natural language, led them to a permanent feeling of isolation [...] as a result of isolation, a sense of family rejection, it is common for the deaf to react apathetically or aggressive - just like any child (WITKOSK 2009: 571).

The social participation of the deaf begins in the family, necessarily through the guarantee of conviviality in a space where there is no repression of their deafness, where they can express themselves in the way that suits them, maintaining pleasant situations of communication and social interaction , presupposing the respect and the knowledge of its singularity reflected in the right of communication, through sign language. What defines the deaf community as a minority, is language, however, not only language, but the characteristic of interacting visually in the world, developing identity issues and a different culture inseparable from their language.

3. "Language comfort": from school to work

The deaf goes through a long trajectory in their schooling, amid language difficulties and differences, and therefore, social and cultural differences. And he comes to the job market with expectations of development, from his workforce, his social participation. However, in this context too, it is different and carries the stigmas and disadvantages of its condition. School communication is still based on unequal bases, since the students of the ruling classes arrive at the school in a position to use "cultural capital" and "school-profitable linguistic capital", since they are familiar with them in their social group (PERSON , 2010).

The education of the deaf in Brazil is nowadays a series of reflections and political disputes, around conflicting questions about the current proposal of educational inclusion. In addition, there is great involvement of the deaf community in decisions about the future of deaf education. Skliar (1997) considers that the bilingual educational proposal contemplates the linguistic right of the deaf person, allowing him to acquire social and cultural knowledge in a language in which he or she has mastery, respecting also the cultural, social, methodological and curricular aspects intrinsic to the deafness. However, there is no proposal for bilingual education for the deaf that can be transplanted from one place to another, from one context to another. What exists are historical and cultural processes that lead to different ways of doing bilingual education in each reality.The deaf do not oppose social inclusion, they oppose ordinary education, education designed for listeners and applied to all, education that seeks universals and does not respect the singularities of the deaf student who, despite their inclusivist pretensions, in the practice, are exclusive, linguistically discriminatory, and pedagogically inefficient (ALBRES and SANTIAGO, 2012, p.294).

The challenge of education for the deaf, in higher education, is mainly to promote their formation, respecting the linguistic difference and, above all, the social condition imposed by difference, recognizing their place of linguistic minority, and providing conditions for a formation of quality. In this sense, we must also discuss the urgency in the training of professional interpreters of Libras, who are able to meet the linguistic specificities of these students at this level of education. Indeed, language policy is not enough if it can not be put into practice. Thus, the educational system must organize itself to serve it.

With regard to linguistic comfort in the process of training the deaf as researchers, Schmitt (2008) describes the research he did in a university with a tradition in studies on deafness and sign language. He interviewed four deaf university students (with masters and doctorates) who reported being satisfied with their studies at the university where they had interpreters from Libras during their graduate studies. However, even so, they explained that it is not easy because the university is also a place of conflict and reported to continue to fight for their rights and their citizenship. The author, in his research, demonstrates that educational inclusion in higher education is possible, however, this is not the reality of all Brazilian universities. The polo university to which he refers, consists of a model, a way for the care of deaf young people in their professional formation.

In the deaf community, young people have been preparing for the labor market, many of them already in the university, looking for professions that they can later exercise, regardless of their bilingual condition (use of Sign Language as first language and Portuguese written as second language language) (SANTIAGO, 2011, p.16).

On the issues of the social integration of the deaf individual, Bueno (1998) explains that the conflictive, contradictory and exploratory forms by which modern industrial society is constituted, involving relations of class domination, race and gender are not taken into account , which result in an abstract view of the social problems of deafness. Today, the difference is accepted, however, in an unjust society that accepts, but does not tend to understand what difference it is. A linguistic policy of majority language teaching based on the principle of treatment of linguistic minorities should educate the population towards the acceptance of linguistic diversity in order to contribute to the liberation of communication in minority languages ​​(MATEUS, 2002).

Sassaki apud Mota (2007) conceptualizes "Social Inclusion" as the process by which society adapts itself to include in its general social systems, people with special needs and, simultaneously, these are prepared to take their roles in society. It is notorious, unfortunately, that the inclusion of deaf people in the labor market largely refers to compliance with the "quota law" Law No. 8.213 / 91, Art. 93, states that: "The company with 100 (one hundred) or more employees are required to fill 2% (two percent) to 5% (five percent) of their positions with rehabilitated beneficiaries or persons with disabilities. "The policy of quotas is part of the policy of increasing opportunity, which recognizes that inequalities originate in all social sectors. It is an affirmative action aimed at achieving equality of opportunity by offering differentiated institutional means for the access of people with disabilities to the legal and service system and, therefore, to enable them to enjoy and exercise fundamental rights , especially with regard to the right of every person to be treated as equal (NERI, CARVALHO, COSTILHA 2002, p.17).

In this sense, even with regard to the Quotas Law, it is perceived that the deaf are struggling to really participate in the logic of the labor market, however, the linguistic difference is still cause difficulties, because, contrary to politics in many cases there are no employees in the company who know about Libras, and there are also companies that do not offer the interpretation service for Libras on occasions when important information is transmitted to their work (integration, training, meetings, etc.), unlike the situation of linguistic comfort that the deaf community has been conquering in the university. Santiago (2011) states that today society

is still unable to provide true inclusion either in work or training, given that few institutions understand the linguistic difference and organize to develop communication with these people through the Brazilian Language of Signals - Libras, which is officially today recognized as the language used by the Brazilian deaf community (SANTIAGO, 2011, page 3).

Most companies and organizations do not recognize sign language as the most comprehensive way to provide accessibility and language comfort for the deaf. With the other deficiencies (blind, wheelchair, etc.) this language barrier does not exist, because they hear and speak the same language (Portuguese). The deaf communicate with a gesture-visual language, communicating comfortably through Libras. Souza (1998) points out that man and language are products of each other, and as a human product, language keeps the history of social relations. Witkoski (2009: 567) explains that "to say that if the deaf person speaks Portuguese will be integrated into the listening community it is a great deception; he will continue to be seen as a handicapped and treated as such. " Therefore, companies must adapt to create a linguistic environment conducive to interactions in the organizational environment, either with the dissemination and teaching of sign language in the company in social and cultural programs, or by contracting interpreting services for Libras for meetings, training, and / or new projects. According to Moura (2009), "in a reality marked by social inequality, the dilution of identities and the exacerbation of competition in the labor market, the linguistic field is also a field of struggle" (MOURA, 2009, p.

Some strategies are used by organizations to cultivate communication, however, not always effective in the daily work environment. One is to rely on Portuguese writing, often through chats through the intranet, for small day-to-day interactions in order to remedy a problem of communication with the deaf official, however, this is a option for occasional situations of communication between employees, and can not extend to any act of communication between company and deaf employee. He should be given access to the guidelines in his first language, in the sense that society is also preparing to meet the difference.Care must be taken with the use of writing, in the sense of not assigning it excessive value in terms of communication and interaction, in order to keep up with the tendencies of the Western world, shifting the focus from oralism to grafocentrism 30. In this sense , the deaf community is also at a disadvantage with regard to the expectation of the majority of the listener, its visual-gestural language does not have standardized and accessible writing, which discredits it in today's society, influenced by grafocentrism and also by the concept of deafness as a abnormality or pathology.

Another incoherent situation is the participation of work meetings where the deaf person can not reach the information that circulates in the oral-auditory language, and therefore, does not have the possibility of participation, usually receives the information passed at the meeting later and in a summarized way, that is to say, it does not have full access to the tacit and explicit knowledge that the listeners have, and to the culture of the company which makes it naturally less competitive, with less possibility of professional ascension towards the listener. Kauchakje (2003), on the naturalization of social injustices, reports that minorities have daily experience of this reality in the various facets of exclusion.

For minority groups, in particular deaf people, inclusion [...] is not only about participation in the social scene (institutions, power structures, culture, etc.) but also participation in their ) configuration and (re) construction for new rights to diversity to be incorporated (KAUCHAKJE, 2003, page 67).

One of the challenges of any company's Human Resources is retention of employees, whether they are disabled or not, and creating a supportive environment for employee development is also a challenge. As far as deaf officials are concerned, this favorable environment exists only if their language, sign language, is respected. The above situations are a small part of the situations in which the deaf person faces in the daily work.

The difficulty of poor schooling and linguistic specificity remains, but development as a citizen and as a producer of surplus value continues in the process of the emergence of this contradictory and complex global society, capable of using the accumulation of capital for the benefit of the less productive society in order to make it productive in a permanent confrontation of interests (SANTIAGO, 2011, p.10).

In the job market, since the interview of selection, the deaf subject should be considered with specific communication needs, when considered the linguistic difference.

Within this contradiction, the deaf have shown themselves capable of being part of this market logic, of being productive and at the same time consumers of this production, however, for this they need some adaptations and services that contemplate their specificities as people with disabilities, concentrated in the linguistic difference, specificity of communication and respect for Sign Language (SANTIAGO, 2011, p.9).In this scenario, the society expects the deaf subject to constitute himself as a bilingual subject, a speaker of sign language and a user of the official language of his country in written form, when he is not expected to be oralized. Unfortunately, not meeting these expectations, even today, it naturally represents a disadvantage, as far as the social reality is concerned, of overlapping the majority oral language in detriment of sign language.

4 Social participation: Bilingual deaf people and the alternation of languages

In adult life, deaf people follow the same paths as listeners: their formation, distant subsistence of their parents, the search for a job, the construction of a professional career and the need for leisure and culture, among others. In these ways, their linguistic condition causes them to face different issues from the majority listener.

Since his schooling, the deaf need that the school contents as well as the school culture be mediated. This happens through the hands of the sign language interpreter, or with the presence of a bilingual teacher. It is in this way, through the use of Sign Language, that he has full access to the knowledge he needs to succeed in his schooling. However, their schooling, in most school settings and curricula, is mainly based on literacy and Portuguese teaching, through which knowledge also circulates for their learning. And, in adult life, the circulation of information and social and specific knowledge happens mainly through the majority language, Portuguese. In this way, many deaf users of Sign Language as first language understand the importance of recognizing Portuguese as their second language and also seek to develop themselves with a deepening of knowledge and use of this second language.

It is necessary to speak about the situation of people in their day to day and the alternation of codes, bilingual subjects that dominate two languages, and who have the possibility of the alternative use of two or more languages ​​in the same situation of conversation, under different forms of bilingualism .

In alternating codes, juxtaposed words or groups of words obey, one to the rules of one language and the other to the rules of the other. Bilingual speakers perfectly distinguish the two codes, whether or not they are conscious of their use in speech or in a sentence of words from another language (OLIVEIRA, 2002, p.95).

Discussions on the social participation of the deaf community involve various areas of society: in culture, leisure, health, education, citizenship, citizens' rights and duties, and this social participation, to a large extent due to the possibility of alternating languages, also for the deaf bilingual subject. However, despite being bilingual and using Portuguese in written form, the condition of not listening, even to an adult deaf person, causes (dis) comfort and exclusion, a social problem to be overcome.

This problem was evident in a situation that will be reported now. In an education conference, in the decision of goals of the education plan of a great city, delegates participated as managers, teachers, listeners, deaf, blind, finally, the school community. The conference system was based on reading the chapters of the plan to be voted upon, and this reading was interpreted in its entirety for Sign Language, and for each item delegates would have to vote for the maintenance or amendment of the text. For the deaf, this process became unworkable, as the interpretation of each item took a few seconds to complete, and when the deaf had access to the information completely, the listeners had already voted and the deaf could not exercise their right to vote. Even with the presence of the interpreter of Libras, the activity was not organized with the purpose of accepting the participation of the minorities, before the presented one. Given this, it is possible to understand that it is not enough to allow physical access, social participation depends on the opportunism of this participation, regardless of the limitations that the linguistic and cultural differences entail.Given the above, we can bring the discussion of Rezende (2001) on the difference between 'disability' and 'disadvantage'. For the author, disability is directly related to disability issues. The disadvantage, in turn, occurs because of the relationship between people with disabilities and their environment, which have limitations in the performance of a given activity.

Disadvantage has a strong, though not unique, social determinant, and requires actions and policies to change attitudes, values ​​and implementations of the conditions for overcoming it, in the sense of "a project of eliminations of social processes that make differences [. ..], factors restricting social participation (KAUCHAKJE, 2003, page 59).

In this way, we can show that the disadvantage with which deaf people live in our society permeates almost all spheres of human relations. We now report another situation regarding access to cultural assets: the deaf community, a few years ago, organizes a campaign and promotes political actions that claim access to national cinema with legend. The campaign has the slogan "Legend for those who do not listen, but gets emotional", which puts, in discussion, accessibility in this context. Today, Brazilian deaf people have access to North American culture, presented by the Holywood productions. However, they are still not allowed to enjoy Brazilian cinema. The deaf's claim in this campaign is access to content through their second language, by means of the subtitling of national films in Portuguese, which indicates that, in certain spaces, the alternation of languages ​​also represents an option of social insertion and access to cultural goods.

This access can and should also be thought of from the perspective of using Libras, with simultaneous interpretation in artistic exhibitions, theater shows, storytelling and cultural events. In these, some institutions and companies have organized to guarantee the participation of the deaf community in the city of São Paulo, however, much has to be done by the deaf and the deaf, to guarantee their participation in the cultural production of this country.

With regard to the discussion on language alternation and linguistic comfort, we must also refer to the knowledge, culture and knowledge circulating in the virtual media and in social networks of the internet. The use of technology and the contact of the deaf community with the world of Web 31 presents the possibility of using these new technologies to share knowledge and culture in their first language with the sharing of videos in Pounds. Gomes and Góes (2011) explain that when the deaf person accesses the internet, their navigation experience is permeated by visual forms of contact and meaning of information and knowledge, especially through their language. For the authors, the access to information and communication through the Libras, is fundamental for the navigability autonomous, interactive and creative. However, it may also cause it to face some limitations in terms of its proficiency in Portuguese and, consequently, in the interpretation of texts and access to specific knowledge in a complete way.

When referring to the deaf Internet user, LIBRAS users, it is necessary to remember that he is a bilingual individual, whose domain of Portuguese is given as a second language. Depending on their level of proficiency, reading in Portuguese can be presented in a fragmented and limited way, compromising the possibility of immersive reading (Gomes and Gomes, 2011, p.6).

On the other hand, the approach of the deaf community to the written modality of the Portuguese language may represent greater access to the structure and ways of saying this language, which is not possible through hearing, in a comfortable way, in the sense of navigability in this language. another language and consequently in this other culture. It is undeniable that accessibility for the deaf is permeated by Sign Language, but this can not be the only way to access the infinity of information and knowledge available on the Web.

Situations in the most different spheres of activity, such as those encountered by the deaf in their daily lives, cause them to have to unfold to interact in a world that is largely a listener and to organize in regard to the alternation of languages, between their mother tongue to, Libras, and the majority language, Portuguese, and integrate into various spheres and contexts.It is important to understand that the alternation of languages ​​is possible only when the deaf subject has formed a solid cognitive base in his or her first language and, from this base, develops a second or third language, sign or oral, in written form, or even even in the oral mode, when convenient or desired. According to Gesser (2009), "Libras will be the symbolic language through which the deaf will mean the world and will structure the bases of their cognition" (2009, 76). In our scenario, the possibility of alternation is intrinsically linked to a quality bilingual education, with due care not to confuse the objectives of this education, which should definitely not be focused on teaching written Portuguese, but this is one of its results.

5. Final considerations: just a beginning of many reflections

Participating effectively in a wide range of social activities is a challenge in terms of the linguistic disadvantage faced by a minority such as the deaf. The situations presented here are repeated daily and are experienced by the deaf beyond the doors of the school or business, political participation, exercising their citizenship, the disadvantage of belonging to this linguistic minority that is accepted but not respected, with regard to the conditions required for unrestricted social participation.

Language alternation for deaf Brazilians is only possible when their schooling is truly based on the principles of quality bilingual education. Who is responsible for the linguistic and cognitive development of his student, in order to provide the acquisition of sign language as the first language and, through it, the teaching of contents and the production of knowledge in the school, including the teaching of Portuguese, in written modality.

In the context of the organizational environment, the overlapping of oral language to the detriment of the use of Sign Language is clear and, unfortunately, this overvaluation maintains the stereotypes about the deaf and the deaf. In view of this, we must advocate the human dimension, which involves the feeling of belonging to a community or society that, in deafness, takes into consideration communication, the linguistic comfort that allows interaction and communication between people, in order to cultures to communicate as well. The presence of a sign language interpreter is a preponderant point in several situations, however, if society is not organized with the aim of providing a level playing field, social participation will not be full.

Regarding the discussions on linguistic comfort and social participation, there is a need to establish a linguistic policy of effective educational and social inclusion and respect for the deaf community, which must be considered with affirmative actions of the State, in order to guide civil society how to organize themselves to provide the effective inclusion of the deaf in Brazil, without they having to adapt to a linguistic environment that is not natural to them.

Grades

28 A person is known as deaf not only because of a physiological issue, in which the sense of hearing is deprived of them, being deaf is much more than that, it is participating in a different world, that is, a different language, language of signs, then, a different culture. The use of the term "hearing impairment" is usually more used in the health area, denoting the pathology itself, while the term "deafness" represents cultural identity rather than an anomaly, since in its own way the "deaf" can learn and activities as well as the "listeners" (SANTIAGO, 2011).
29 Law 10.436 / 02 of 04/24/2002 - disposes on the Brazilian Language of Signals - Pounds and gives other measures. Art. 1 The Brazilian Language of Signals - Pounds and other associated expression resources is recognized as a legal means of communication and expression. Single paragraph. It is understood as the Brazilian Language of Signals - Libras the form of communication and expression, in which the linguistic system of a visual-motor nature, with its own grammatical structure, constitute a linguistic system of transmission of ideas and facts, originating from communities of deaf people of Brazil.
30 Grafocentrism: characteristic of modern society in conferring extreme social, ethical, legal and moral value on everything that is written.
31 Web is an English word that means web or network. With the advent of the internet, the web has come to designate the network that connects computers worldwide, the World Wide Web (WWW). http://www.significados.com.br/web/
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