PHONIC METHOD AND MEDICALIZATION: for the deaf heterogeneity and education

Abstract

In this article our goal is to bring a discussion over the medicalization profile of the literacy process for deaf people, especially if it is based on phonic perspectives, part of the National Literacy Policy (PNA). The analysis we present on the document allowed us to observe a secret recommendation of a method to teach children how to read and write, including the deaf ones. The PNA defense of a methodological approach based on phonics instruction and on phonological awareness is superior to any other and must be taken as a principle in the initial phase of literacy is medicalizing because it diminishes the complexity of the literacy process and does not take into consideration the heterogeneity that highlights different ways of learning – of the hearing child and the deaf child. We also claim that any democratic political proposal needs to consider the plurality of scientific studies ever made about literacy and, more than that, consider the cultural, social, economic, and political diversity that determines different actors involved in the literacy process (teachers, students, and schools). Finally, we emphasize that a supposedly inclusive politics needs to recognize different ways of being and learning of deaf children, their linguistic possibilities, and their cultural diversity.