Language and identity: an investigation of the relations between text, image and memory in the case of English in Brazil

Abstract

This project is part of a more extensive ongoing research project that investigates discourses about the English language in Brazil, produced in the media and government educational sectors. The aim of the research on discourses about the English language is to understand the imaginary and symbolic representations of this language in Brazil and their influence in the constitution of a Brazilian national identity. In order to respond to the need of complementation of the analytical corpus as well as to the existence of some theoretical and analytical gaps, the aim of the current project is to correct this theoretical gap in the following domains: a) the ties between social memory, language and history and their consequences for the formation of subjects and discourses; b) relationships between text and image in the discursive production of contemporary societies; c) the representation of the speaking body in the discursive practices of Western contemporary societies. This theoretical framework will be applied to the corpus analysis with the objective of comprehending, in what concerns the representations of the English language, the determinations between the two investigated discursive domains as well as the kind(s) of relationship between, on the one hand, text, image and the construction of a body that speaks English, and, on the other, between memory and language (both in their historical constitution and in current discursive practices). (AU)