Narrativas e experiências de aprendizagem de inglês em contexto de vulnerabilidade social: um estudo de caso

Abstract

According to the Brazilian Curriculum Guidelines for High School: Knowledge of Foreign Languages (OCEM-LE), the teaching of foreign languages, in addition to meeting linguistic and instrumental objectives, is also part of an inclusion project aimed at "working at the level of the education of individuals, of citizens" (BRASIL, 2006, p. 97). In addition, in order to prepare children and young people to be critical and informed citizens, it is necessary to have new global visions, new literacy practices, considering local and global contexts (MACIEL, 2011). The teaching of English is strongly related to the phenomenon of globalization (COX, ASSIS-PETERSON, 2007) and this phenomenon has required new skills for engagement and participation in diverse contexts (MERRYFIELD; DUTY, 2008). However, globalization is a contradictory phenomenon (COOPPAN, 2004) with respect to its inclusion and exclusion characteristics. These characteristics highlight the idea of globalized spaces (PETRI; WEBER, 2006), places, sectors and social groups privileged by globalization and others excluded from them. Based on such reflections, this work investigated the teaching and learning of English in a context of social vulnerability. To this end, a case study was carried out with an in-service teacher of English, coming from a community in social vulnerability. The main objective of this research was to know the life history and experiences of this teacher in her process of learning and teaching English. Furthermore, this work had specific objectives: to understand the role that English teaching can play in less favored communities, through the experiences of the participant-teacher-; to understand the relevance of English learning to the participant-teacher- and the possible implications of this process; to analyze the meanings that the participant gives to the learning of English. For the generation of data, the approach of narrative research was adopted, whose main instruments were the exchange of e-mails, interviews and questionnaires. These procedures resulted in eight narratives that were the main data of this research. The data generated were analyzed and categorized based on Miccoli's (2007) studies on English learning experiences. The results provided an insight into the participant's English learning process as well as her life history. Also, data analysis allowed for a better understanding of the implications of the process of teaching English in Brazil and revealed aspects related to social, cultural and economic inclusion and development associated with learning English. The results also revealed issues that point to the inefficiency of the public school in teaching English and the poor training of foreign language teachers. Finally, as a contribution to the area of Applied Linguistics, this work promotes the awareness of the relevance of teaching and learning English at the present time, for the social inclusion and training of critical and participative citizens in a globalized world.