Contribuições da psicolinguística para a educação de surdos: as vantagens do bilinguismo

Abstract

Since the 1980s, bilingual education for deaf people has been a widespread and burgeoning education proposition in several countries around the world, and linguistics research has been playing a pivotal role in such development. This paper looks at the contribution of Psycholinguistics in education for the deaf, stemming from two highly relevant topics: 1. linguistic deprivation and age of exposure to sign language; 2. cross-language activation to recognize words in L2. Research demonstrates that the age of sign language as L1 acquisition deeply aff ects L1 and L2 acquisition, processing, and profi ciency. It also emphasizes the importance of early exposure to sign language and bilingual education for the deaf. Scholarship about L2 lexical recognition sheds light on the coactivation of words and signs, even in deaf people who are L2 highly proficient. Research such as this contributes to our understanding of the bilingual path that deaf people take to writing acquisition, as deaf bilinguals often use L1 in face-to-face interaction but L2 in writing interactions.