A representação mental do nome na Língua Portuguesa e em Libras

Abstract

Teaching and learning how to ‘read and write’ are part of the live of teachers and students. First of all, because these two people are living the literacy and writing process in the classroom from different perspectives, one with the responsibility of teaching and the other with the concern of learning. Second, because they are individuals with different lives and different ways of thinking that may occasionally fit into the Cartesian-academic model kept by the school structure. This happens with most teachers and students, but when the purpose is teaching and learning how to read and write in Portuguese for deaf students who are sign language practitioners, things get more complicated. Therefore, this dissertation aims to understand the mental representation of the name in both Portuguese and Brazilian Sign Language (Libras) and to analyze whether there are similarities or differences in the grammatical structures of the two languages. This is a major step in a way to start a discussion on how to develop literacy strategies for deaf students, once teachers and school institutions are often unaware of the particularities of the structures of these both languages. The name has a key role in this research because it is a pat of speech whose teaching is more systematized in the school environment and because it has a particular representation in Portuguese language (an oral language) and in Libras (a sign language). The first has a sequential and linear structure, whose organization aims to represent the name through several parts with different functions in the same sentence. The second, as a visual-spatial language, uses the name representation in a global way and in several visual compositions to conceive just one element. Therefore, this research uses the descriptive analysis as methodology, in which sections of poems and phrases were chosen to explain each grammatical resource in the use of the name and present the grammatical differences or similarities among these both languages, in order to think about strategies and possibilities of teaching Portuguese as a second language for deaf students. Therefore, this research are made into two methodology, one with a theoretical-conceptual basis and the other with an empirical basis. The first proposes a theorization of the grammatical structures of the both languages in question. The second performs descriptive analyzes of parts of poems and phrases, chosen especially in order to evaluate each grammatical resource. Within this perspective, the author's experiences in the observations of deaf students' texts were also necessary, as theoretical assumptions alone were not enough to reflect on the grammatical differences or similarities of these languages. It was necessary in order to base the elaboration of strategies and possibilities of the teaching of Portuguese as a second language to deaf students. With these analyzes we realize some considerations that are relevant to the education of the deaf: Libras does not have signs that represent some connectives in Portuguese like articles, prepositions, prepositional phrases, etc. however this absence does not affect the understanding and transmission of information based only on these contents.