Era uma vez... um chapeuzinho, seis surdos, seis histórias

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to investigate the singularity of deaf student’s writing, observing and analyzing on how their life story influences on their written Portuguese. The research was based on the analysis of the texts that were written an rewritten about the fairytale of Little Red Riding Hood, written by six deaf students, of the 7th grade, that study at the Instituto Cearense de Educação de Surdos (ICES), with the objective of observing the individual characteristics present in each texts of written by the six students. Besides the collection of the texts, in May and November 2005, there were carried out three interviews, all of them made with the help of an interpreter. The first interview was made through a questionnaire, in May 2005; the second one was structured, and the other was semi-structured, both were made in November 2005. The objective of the interviews sere to collect data on the life story of the six students subjects, and also on their experiences in the school and with their families, and their opinion on the importance of the use of Portuguese language and of LIBRAS (Brazilian Sign Language). The data collected in the interviews, was compared with the analysis of the characteristics of the student’s text, trying to observe how their life story could be present in their writing, as we believed that the act of writing is a reflex of our discursive formation. This research, was carried out based on the social-interactive of the language, agree with the studies of Vygotsky and Bakhtin. Besides the review of great researchers Vygotsky and Bakhtin, I also present in this study a brief history deaf education and some characteristics of the LIBRAS (Brazilian Sign Language), as I agree these are some of the factors that influence the writing of the deaf.