The Spanish National Deaf School: Portraits from the Nineteenth Century

5. The Fruit of Deaf Resistance: Patricio García

116 5 The Fruit of Deaf Resistance: Patricio García For the boy who talks back, bread and the cane. (“Al mozo respondón, pan y bastón.”) —Spanish proverb The force with which individuals or groups resist discipline or express new desires has a transformative power on the most rigid institutions, however inflexible they might be. —Michelle Perrot1 On Tuesday, January 8, 1878, the director general of Public Instruction, José Cárdenas, arrived unannounced at the National School for DeafMutes and the Blind.2 The impetus for his visit was a note delivered to the Ministry of Development by a deaf alumnus, José Soriano.3 Written in pencil in a childish hand and folded several times (perhaps so it would fit into a pocket), the note was signed, “Patricio García, Deaf-Mute.” The author of the note stated that a teachers’ aide, José García, had beaten him with a rope in the school’s confinement room, where unruly students were sometimes sent as punishment. Authorities at the school referred to the confinement room as the encierro, the “lockup,” but Patricio called it the calabozo, that is, “jail cell” or “dungeon.” Patricio wrote that he had been kept there for a week without food and subjected to daily beatings. As a result, he had an injured hand—a particularly serious matter for those who communicate in sign language—and this, he emphasized , was not his fault, but rather, it was because of the aides who had beaten him.4 Patricio García 117 Since Manuel Tinoco’s expulsion in the fall of 1876, incidents of physical abuse had continued at the National School. However, instead of running away, as Manuel had done, students began to fight back against their tormentors, meeting force with force. Such was the case in the winter of 1877, when a deaf boy had been ordered to spend the night in confinement as punishment.5 His schoolmates were already in bed when, around midnight, one of them, Francisco Conesa, noticed that the two teaching assistants charged with watching over the youths had left the dormitory and were headed downstairs to the confinement cell.6 Conesa’s suspicions were understandable because on an earlier occasion, he had been punished cruelly by one of the staff.7 Convinced that the assistants were about to inflict corporal punishment on their companion, the deaf boys threw on their clothes and prepared to defend one of their own. When the doorman, Cecilio Matallana, attempted to prevent them from leaving the dormitory, a heated battle ensued between stick-wielding employees and deaf students armed with whatever they found at hand. Before long, Director Pedro Cabello, whose quarters were adjacent to the students,’ heard shouts and the sounds of a scuffle. He entered the dormitory to find the doorman in the thick of the fray, bleeding from the nose and exchanging blows with several of the older youths, while all around him students engaged in hand-to-hand combat with teaching assistants and other employees responsible for their well-being. Eventually the melee ended (according to Cabello, his mere presence sufficed to send the deaf combatants scurrying for their beds, where, at his command, they kneeled in submission to his authority).8 Once order was restored, Cabello hushed up the incident, just as he had when Manuel Tinoco ran away from school. The assistants who had provoked the conflict by slipping out of the dormitory during the night, leaving their wards unattended and thus arousing their suspicions, went unpunished.9 So the outcome of the nocturnal altercation was at best a draw. Experience showed that while running away led only to expulsion, fighting with the staff was equally ineffective. Corporal punishment and the cover-up that went with it continued unabated at the National School. Nevertheless, it was significant that the students had once again engaged in collective action. They had done so months earlier, when they facilitated Manuel Tinoco’s escape, and that event may have triggered a cycle of collective resistance. In truth, such behavior had a long history at the 118 Patricio García’s recounting of his treatment at the National School for Deaf-Mutes. (Courtesy of Archivo General de la Administraci ón Civil, leg. 6244, Educación y Ciencia.) Patricio García 119 National School. Instances of collective action (generally in response to physical abuse and occasionally involving force) are documented from the earliest...