Issues of Oppression

In this section of Session 3 we introduce the ideas of Paulo Freire.  There is some controversy over his ideas, but what he has to say gives us a lot of thought in the deafness field.  His way of expressing the ideas sometimes seems harsh.  However, there is great deal to learn.

Although we have many models and ideas about bilingualism, most of our attention has been directed to situations where the languages are of similar status.  Even though in any single country a certain language may be that of a minority, there will exist one country in the world where that language is spoken by a majority.  This is true of Urdu in the UK or Mandarin in the Chinese community in Britain.  Although members of these communities are treated as linguistic minorities, they have a "home country", where that language is the principal one used - in fact there may be more users than there are in the UK. 

When we talk about deaf people as a linguistic minority, there is no comparable situation.  Not only are deaf people outnumbered in the UK, there is no cultural homeland and there is no situation where the language is used by a majority.  This has major implications for the type of bilingualism which occurs; and it also has implications for the way in which non-deaf people learn the language.

These notes will return to the last point towards the end as it is one which links all the elements of the unit and it should offer a clear idea of what the aims are and how we are to achieve them.

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This page was last modified January 29, 2007
jim.kyle@bris.ac.uk