When Theater is at the Vanguard:

Abstract

This article investigates the staging of Jean-Nicolas Bouilly’s play L’Abbé de l’Épée, [The deaf-mute or the Abbot de l’Épée] during Brazil's imperial period. The objective was to analyze how multiple discourses on deafness that circulated in the media, combined with the performance of the Portuguese actress Ludovina Soares da Costa as a deaf-mute young man motivated the founding of Brazil's first institution for the deaf, in Rio de Janeiro. The documentary study surveyed material from the newspaper collection at the Hemeroteca da Biblioteca Nacional, for periodicals from 1810 through 1860, reviewing ads, news and reviews of the performances. The results highlight the transmission of conceptions about deafness in the local society through theater.

Keywords

• Performance
• Gender
• History of Brazilian Theater
• Deaf Studies
• History of Deaf Education