(Des)encontros do materno-estrangeiro para professores/as brasileiros/as no ensino de Português como Língua Estrangeira (PLE)

Abstract

When placing themselves in the position of a foreign language teacher in a context of teaching and learning Portuguese as a Foreign Language (PLE), the identity constitution of Brazilian pre-service teachers can be affected by the unfamiliar-familiar conflict (Freud, 1919 [2010]; Coracini, 2007) with their own mother tongue. This research has the general objective of identifying and discussing the possible impacts of the representations of pre-service foreign language teachers, related to teaching and learning, arising from their practice as PLE intern teachers, specifically the representations of themselves as teachers, of mother tongue and/or of foreign language. The research has the specific objective of understanding the subject-language relationship and the effects of possible confrontations in this relationship, as well as their impact on the identity constitution of research participants, during PLE teaching-learning. The guiding question of the research questions the possible effects of the PLE teaching practice on the identity constitution of Brazilian pre-service foreign language teachers. As a guiding hypothesis, I propose that conflicts between whats is called mother and foreign, inherent to the subject-language relationship, affect the education of language teachers, based on the relationship they develop (or not) with the Portuguese language, since that they have it as their mother tongue, when teaching it as a foreign language. Methodologically, the research instrument used to generate analysis material was an informative questionnaire and a semi-structured interview script. The participants interviewed were pre-service teachers who participated in a supervised PLE internship at a given public university. Supported by the perspective of Franco-Brazilian Discourse Analysis, I analyzed the effects of meaning and the discursive functioning that supports the representations of the research participants. The justification for this research is to contribute to the field of Applied Linguistics and to academic discussions regarding the teaching-learning relationship of foreign languages, and discussing whether (and how) the impacts of teaching PLE influence the identity constitution of Brazilian pre-service teachers, who teach portuguese as a foreign language, and have Portuguese as their mother tongue. It was concluded that, possibly, the subject-teacher, with the experience of teaching and being placed in the place of supposedly knowing of the language they have as mother tongue, in a foreign language context, experiences the strange, in what seemed to be solely familiar with the language, as he/she notices the difficulties that his/her foreign students present during the classes. There is also a strong interpellation of the Portuguese language on the subject, who learned the grammar of Portuguese in regular school, as the need for norms, grammar, and for the correct speaking resonates in the participants' sayings. Furthermore, it is possible to say that the designation “Portuguese as a host language” [Português como Língua de Acolhimento] given to the PLE language, in the research corpus, is a way for language teachers to find refuge or to feel welcome in the language when they experience the strange-familiar in teaching PLE.