Note From the Authors

As authors of these guidelines, we recognize that we are all white. We want to thank BIPOC members of Deaf communities for providing their feedback to ensure that we would present a perspective that aligns with a multilingual, multicultural, multimodal perspective and honors home/heritage languages, cultures, race, gender, abilities, and other multiple and intersecting identities. We also wanted to mention that while we use the term “BE-SIG” throughout the guidelines, we are in the process of proposing a name change for the BE-SIG so that it aligns with Multilingual Deaf Education.

Additionally, we wanted to recognize the ongoing discussions and perspectives that have changed and are still in the process of changing since we wrote this document. This includes terminology regarding antiracist, antibias education; varying perspectives on social justice, transformative justice, and restorative justice; and terms of identity including Deaf, deaf, Hard of Hearing, DeafDisabled, DeafBlind, LGBTQIA+, etc.

With all this in mind, we feel it is important to also acknowledge our awareness of our own bias and privilege.

We welcome continued and ongoing conversations and invite you to join us on this journey.