Youtube and deafness: analysis of discourses produced by deaf people on virtual enviroment

Abstract

Currently, YouTube has dominated the segment of online videos in the world, and in Brazil it is no different. Due to the site’s visibility, YouTube can be looked as a possibility of expression for a person that is deaf, as it allows discourses, made in sign language, to be registered. This study aimed to analize discourses produced by deaf people and posted on YouTube regarding the themes of deaf culture, aspects of the living environment between hearing and deaf and political manifestations. The analysis methodology used was qualitative in a socio-historical approach. This study offered us data and conditions to consider YouTube as a tool to provide deaf people a new interactive space in their discursive production by establishing interaction. In light of Bakhtin’s theory of language, it was possible to identify the social voices present in the discourses as well as the change in otherness, dialogic, enunciation, heteroglossy and responsiveness. With this study, it was possible to conclude that, through YouTube deaf people were able to establish a reason to value the “being deaf”, which represent the possibility of reconstructing, through sign language, a new view about deafness.