Review of d/Deaf and d/Dumb: A Portrait of a Deaf Kid as a Young Superhero

Currently an assistant professor of early childhood education at Pennsylvania State University, Joseph Michael Valente has written a book that is part autobiography, part autobiographical novel, and part autoethnography. The work chronicles his life as a deaf person struggling with the hearing world, which still maintains a pathological view of deafness. He also discusses the cultural view of Deaf people. Incorporated into each chapter are action, adventure, comedy, and history, genres that make the work very entertaining. He interviewed his family and classmates for their thoughts about his life. He said that he tracked his life as a young deaf kid to my development as a scholar and as a Deaf person up to this very moment that I am writing. I now realize that this work and this journey will never be complete” (11).

When he was in elementary school, his favorite teacher told him about the power of words. He recognized then that he had the skills to use his words. Words are power. “Words are superpowers,” he relates. “I start grasping how words can help me. I can defend myself when I’m in trouble, and I can come up with comebacks when kids tease me” (5). He saw himself as a caped superhero that tries to fit into the world. The school and people around him wanted to “fix” him. They did not want him to use sign language. Learning sign language would be learning literacy, as in “reading and writing.” He learned that literacy could both lead to punishment and also be a powerful tool: “The power of literacy is coveted by both the marginalizers and marginalized” (37). He recognized the oppressive nature of those in his school who were against learning sign language.

Valente quotes many researchers, including Michel Foucault, who support his points. On page 36 Valente mentions Foucault’s (1995) observation that our bodies are a battlefield that forces us to navigate the binary fields determined by normative power/knowledge constructs: “we can see in the slapping of children’s hands by a teacher under the sway of audism the workings of the humanizing process of normalizing and disciplining the failing, unruly body” (38). Valente remembers being slapped on the hand as a message that signing is unwanted, whereas speech is desirable. He points out that many Deaf people are set back tremendously because of not being able to sign at an early age, which is critical for language learning. According to Foucault, a power struggle exists between Valente and the pathological view of deafness held by hearing people. The experiences of Valente and many other Deaf people is that the pathological perspective amounts to a social control that prevents him from being who he really is. Instead, he was trained to be like everyone else—to adopt the view of hearing people who oppose the use of sign language.

Valente did not learn ASL until he enrolled in college, where he realized that the cultural view of deafness is very positive. He could see that the other deaf students were quite happy to be deaf. They had their own culture and language and did not need to be “fixed.” As a result, he decided to take ASL classes, where he met a number of Deaf people. He began acquiring Deaf people’s views of the world—and then he met a Deaf teacher who had a cochlear implant, which dumbfounded him. It struck him that the use of the device by a culturally Deaf person was an example of phonocentric colonialism, which has caused many Deaf people to be stuck in between two views of Deafness. Although they find that some aids like cochlear implants work for them, they remain culturally Deaf, and that will never change.

Valente says of the project, “Doing this study has been both a personal and professional journey for me. Since I was mainstreamed as a child, I never had the chance to be a part of the ‘Deaf-world.’ But now I have the privilege of experiencing what it is like to be in a school for the deaf and around Deaf people. It’s a homecoming of sorts for me.”

In the last chapter Valente describes his full immersion in the Deaf world, which took place when he went to Ben Bahan’s house for a week and several other times during the summer. Throughout his stay, he did not use his hearing aids but fully experienced himself as a Deaf person. Bahan picked him up at the airport and took him to Frederick, MD, where they visited the Maryland School for the Deaf. Valente also visited Gallaudet University, an hour’s drive away. There he was introduced to a few of Ben’s friends, like Jamie Tucker, superintendent of the Maryland School for the Deaf. Valente had a good discussion with Tucker about disability. When Valente stated that he did not need an interpreter at work, Tucker asked why. Valente replied that he did not have a disability. When Tucker became agitated, Valente realized the import of his words. Bahan then explained the concept of “signing impaired.” Deaf people can use interpreters and not be looked on as having a disability. Tucker added, “The interpreter is for all of us.”

I am glad I read this book. There were a lot of moments when I completely related to Valente. I was born hearing and developed a hearing impairment at five years of age. I went to a mainstreamed school and was often put down for not speaking clearly and for having to be taken out of class for speech training. After graduating from high school, I enrolled at Gallaudet University and became Deaf. I learned ASL. Learning ASL has done many great things for me. Right now I am teaching at Gallaudet University, and that shows that I am successful and capable of doing anything I set my mind to. Joseph Michael Valente helps me show that using ASL makes me a whole person—and that my journey is not complete.