Representações sociais e ensino de geografia: a geografia revelada no samba

Abstract

The present dissertation proposes to present how socially shared knowledge, present in samba music, hinders the process of discovery and learning of contents of Geography in Basic Education. For this, the research has as general objective to identify which meanings that teachers of Geography attribute to the use of samba music as a pedagogic resource. This dissertation also aims at recognizing teachers‘ impressions of pupils‘ understanding in relation to the possible pedagogic gain one may have when they bring popular knowledge, materialised through samba, to classroom practices. Besides, this research is willing to investigate whether or not teachers use samba as a possible methodological tool. The study presents the development of the teaching of school Geography, singling out the trends of critical and humanistic Geography that most influence both the formation and the teaching of the school subject nowadays. Moreover, it presents, in a concise fashion, the importance samba music to the Brazilian popular culture, in relation to the production of meanings derived from this relationship. The study stems from Social Representation Theories (SRT), based on Serge Moscovici (2003) and Denise Jodelet (2009), who guides the construction of online questionnaires as research instrument, incorporating the technique of free evocation of lexical items and the methodology of mass subject discourse (LEFÈVRE & LEFÈVRE, 2000) to analyse the answers obtained in a group of 67 teachers of Geography from both private schools and schools from the private sector in the state of Rio de Janeiro. This research led us to understand that culture, learning and identity are the elements that most meaning to the senses attributed by the interviewees in relation to the teaching of Geography and samba. The answers also presented positive information about the relevance of using popular culture elements in the classroom for the teacher‘s pedagogic practice as well as for the teaching-learning process and for the building of pupils‘ citizenship awareness. This study, which is inserted in the context of a Professional Master Course, has allowed us to generate data that suggest pedagogic strategies for the teaching of Geography, which, through the use of samba music, can mediate knowledge and lead pupils to think of different contexts and learning possibilities of the school subject.