A CO-CONSTRUÇÃO DE IDENTIDADES SOCIAIS EM SALA DE AULA DE LÍNGUA

Abstract

This article aims to investigate how talk-in-interaction data evince a negotiation of social identities in language classrooms. The classroom is not conceived as a hegemonic space, but rather as a space consisting of people belonging to certain communities of practice. Thus, data from two surveys (JUNG, 2003; SEMECHECHEM, 2008) show that in the classroom participants must assume not only their identities as teacher and students, but also the identity relation with their communities. Jung’s data show that gender identity and German ethnic and linguistic identity are in a complex relationship in the community, which is evidenced in the behavior that men and women take on in relation to the values associated with urbanity. The school reinforces this reality in the classrooms, since it positively ratifi es a female hegemonic identity, which corresponds to a prestigious female identity in the local community. However, some boys in the 4th grade learned to negotiate the marks of hegemonic female identity of the school, thus acquiring the status of excellent students, and at the same time, they maintain traces of the German settler identity. Semechechem’s data also indicate identity and gender as relevant factors in the classroom. Thus, communitary identity issues must be taken into consideration in what refers to the teaching and learning of a language