Dicionários bilíngues português-Libras no ensino para surdos: usos e funções

Abstract

Dictionaries represent an important tool in languages teaching/learning process. It is due to the scientific investment in the field of lato sensu lexicography, area responsible for elaborating the product “dictionary” and/or theories about it. However, from the research performed here, it was possible to observe how incipient the works which dedicate to the field of lexicography of sign language are. It is noticed that this investigation area is still in embryonic stage and, therefore, it urgently needs more attention and more researches for them to positively reverberate in the production of new sign language dictionaries in different spaces and possibilities of usage. It is assumed, in this work, lexicography as branch of linguistics which operates in two fronts, namely, practical and theoretical (or metalexicographic), and may be carried out from different affiliations. Thus, this is a qualitative research, of exploratory nature, and it is characterized as a metalexicographic study, focusing on the use of the dictionary and on the necessities of the users. It dialogues with the bilingual and the pedagogical lexicography, two investigation lines anchored in the lexicography great area, intersecting with deaf people education. It is interesting for this work to investigate what contribution a dictionary could give to the didactic-pedagogical demands and the demands of learning the Portuguese language as a non-native language in deaf people’s basic education. Regarding the public policies which advocate the bilingual teaching for deaf people and the legislations which endorse this practice, it is said that the Brazilian Sign Language (Libras), because it is the constitution language of the deaf individual, must be taught as the first language and the Portuguese must be ministered as the second language in the written modality. However, concerning the Portuguese language teaching for non-native students, as it is the case with deaf people, it is necessary to pay attention to linguistic rights and to the accessibility in the materials made available as pedagogical support. Because there are no school dictionaries directed to this audience, there is just the possibility to use standard lexicographic works which involve the Portuguese-Libras linguistic pair. In this sense, this study has as specific objectives: i) to investigate if there is and how Portuguese-Libras dictionaries are used, as well as their respective functions in the context of teaching of Portuguese as L2 for deaf people in Elementary School (do sexto ao nono ano) in schools or educational bilingual programs in the teachers’ perspective, understanding the teacher as essential and indispensable part in the presentation of the dictionary to students and in the mediation of its use in and out of the classroom; ii) to identify which dictionary or dictionaries is/are preferably indicated and used by these teachers and the reasons which make them choose such dictionary rather than others. In order to reach the proposed objectives, two instruments were used, a questionnaire and a semi-structured interview, aiming to obtain the necessary and sufficient data to subsidize this study, which counted on the participation of four bilingual teachers, who responded to the instruments based on their beliefs, experiences and classroom practices in teaching Portuguese as L2 for deaf people. The obtained data were organized by analysis categories and were qualitatively examined, separated according to their origin instrument. The results point out that both dictionaries and other devices are used in the classroom to help the Portuguese as a second language teaching-learning process, however, due to some limitations presented in the existing lexicographic works, the teachers end up developing their own strategies, involving the deaf students, to create customized materials according to these students’ educational and learning necessities. From the contributions given by the participants, it is possible to conclude that the field of lexicography still has a lot to dialogue with the field of deaf people education, mainly regarding the teaching of Portuguese as a second language, in a way to think of a typology of dictionaries suitable for this setting and for the necessities of the final consumer of this product, the deaf students.