134 Deaf Epistemologies, Identity, and Learning
cartography: “a politically informed map of one’s historical and social locations
[ enables] the analysis of situated formations of power and hence the elaboration
of adequate forms of resistance” (Braidotti, 2011, p. 271). Jerry’s narrative touches
upon external power relations and discourses of the deaf school, clergy, hearing
family members, and structures of society, which sometimes have intruded deeply
into the private sphere, while also throwing a light on his internal lines of power, with
resilience and affirmative strength for the process of navigating subjectivity. “[...]
power is a situation or a process, not an object or an essence. Subjectivity is the effect
of these constant flows of in-between power connections” (Braidotti, 2011, p. 4).
I have explored the notion of potentiality in relation to the “realized and unre-
alized possibilities of being deaf,” which need to be understood against the back-
ground of educational developments that have brought challenges for deaf people
in their desire to participate in society as full citizens (De Clerck, 2016b; De Clerck,
2015; Jamieson & Moores, 2011; Moores, 2016; also see the discussion on ICED’s
Accord for the Future in Chapter 1).
The notion of potentiality draws on a sociocultural conception of human beings
as learners, which “is an epistemological and ontological perspective of subjectivity:
human beings are active subjects who shape their selves, relations with other peo-
ple, material and sociocultural worlds and also give meaning to these selves, rela-
tions, and material and sociocultural environments” (De Clerck, 2016b, p. 243; also
see De Clerck & Pinxten, 2012, 2016). This provides room for an affirmative stance
from where new horizons can be explored: “power is not only negative or confining
(potestas), but also affirmative (potentia) or productive or alternate subject posi-
tions and social relations” (Braidotti, 2011, p. 97). The lived experience of Jerry
reveals the generative potentiality of affirmative power, which enables him to live up
to his potential and to bloom. After a long period of being curtailed, seeing alterna-
tive new futures on the horizon was like an earthquake in his emotional geography.Having developed myself for many years, I more and more feel that I am a
human being too. I feel that I am strong. Sometimes, other people can look
up to me for the things I am doing, can respect me for the things I say. I feel
that my words can be important, too, that that is possible. That they are not
just thrown away, that I can also say something of which people think, Ah. I
felt that something was not right at a very young age. I grew up seeing my par-
ents signing and that was good. But I felt blocked: I wasn’t allowed to bloom.
I felt that something was not right, but I didn’t know what. Now, I know: it is
not because we have a disability, but a communication disability, and hearing
people often have wrong representations of us. That brought me to under-
stand a lot of things.
Hearing people didn’t have enough information about us. We also didn’t
explain things well. Many deaf people also accepted that hearing people
presented themselves as superior. Accepted, accepted. School was very wrong
too, everything. I really felt curtailed, blocked, but I overcame that barrier.
I definitely feel very relieved now.In his description of the transition from being to becoming, Jerry emphasizes the
open-endedness of the nomadic process: “I am looking for me, myself, who I am as a